Why a teachers strike is bad for Chicago

With its leaders’ petulance and insults, the Chicago Teachers Union is disrespecting Mayor Lori Lightfoot. The CTU’s persistent ridicule will make it more difficult for her to perform one of her most crucial duties long after this needless strike concludes.

Lightfoot is the face of Chicago, its ambassador to the world. Her to-do list includes protecting this city’s role in the global economy, luring foreign investors, expanding job opportunities for Chicagoans, and enhancing the private-sector commerce that delivers billions of tax dollars to local governments — Chicago Public Schools included.

Does it matter to CTU leaders that their insults toward Lightfoot and her team diminish her and the Chicagoans who elected her? Union leaders seem determined to cheapen her office. On Wednesday, CTU leadership brought a chanting, bucket-drumming throng to City Hall as Lightfoot unveiled her plan to fill an $838 million budget gap. Union President Jesse Sharkey accused Lightfoot of being concerned only with “what’s convenient and profitable for the city’s elites.” Later, CTU said it would offer teachers civil disobedience training: “To combat the mayor’s stonewalling, we may need to ratchet up pressure.”

All such CTU antics, which portray Chicago to the world as a city reeling in dysfunction, allegedly are for the children. Right.

Chicago backs its teachers, as Lightfoot’s generous contract offer attests. But Chicago also has to back its mayor. Enough insults, CTU. Go back to Chicago’s students.