Chicago Mayor Suddenly Exempts Police From Hiring Freeze Amid Growing Pushback

Democratic Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson exempted the Chicago Police Department (CPD) from a proposed citywide hiring freeze following a wave of backlash, The Chicago Tribune reported on Wednesday.

The Johnson administration said Wednesday that the citywide hiring freeze for government positions, announced Monday, had always excluded the CPD, despite questions from media and city council members not being answered, according to the Tribune. Chicago Budget Director Annette Guzman sent a memo after the original announcement to commissioners and department heads that the hiring freeze would affect all city government departments and positions, which appeared to include the CPD, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

LaKesha Gage Woodard, Johnson’s budget team spokesperson, told the Tribune that CPD and the fire department were not included in the initial decision to freeze city hiring. Some city councilmen said they received no clarification from the administration about whether the freeze included the CPD.

“I didn’t know whether the hiring freeze applied to our first responders, our Police Department and Fire Department,” Chicago alderman Chris Taliaferro, Johnson’s police and fire committee chair, told the Tribune. “I did tell I think it would be a bad decision for us to not exempt our police and fire, because we are constantly losing police officers and we can’t keep up with attrition.”

The freeze was meant to make