(The Center Square) – The Chicago City Council has a special meeting scheduled on Wednesday afternoon to consider a proposal Mayor Brandon Johnson said was provoked by President Donald Trump’s administration.
The mayor said the Reverend Jesse L. Jackson Sr. Fair Access to Democracy Ordinance would protect poll workers, voters and election-related activities.
“The provocation really is just looking at what’s coming from the federal government, where the president has made it very clear that he wants to suppress the vote of working people,” Johnson said at a youth jobs event on Tuesday.
The mayor was asked why he called the meeting to consider the ordinance six days before a primary election.
“Look, it’s always the right time to move an agenda to protect people. I’m gonna work with city council,” Johnson said.
Chicago Flips Red founder Zoe Leigh said she supports the Save America Act, because federal law must take priority over symbolic ordinances.
“The city has spent billions of dollars of our taxpaying money to continue to go on with the shenanigans, just like the Fair Access to Democracy,” Leigh told The Center Square.
Leigh said naming the ordinance after Jesse Jackson Sr. does not change the fact that Chicago still prioritizes protections for people in the country illegally over taxpaying citizens.
Leigh said the mayor is trying to send a message that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement will not be able to visit polling places.
“It’s the typical Democratic machine, communist leadership that we have seen played out since Brandon Johnson has been in office since 2023,” Leigh said.
Primary Election Day is next Tuesday, March 17, in Illinois. Early voting started Feb. 5.
