Chicago FOP donates nearly $60,000 to Foxx’s challenger
Chicago police’s largest union Wednesday donated $57,800 to Kim Foxx’s challenger in the Cook County state’s attorney’s race in what the union president said is the beginning of a bid to flex more political influence.
The influx from the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 7 eclipses the total contributions Republican Pat O’Brien reported during the second quarter. In addition to the FOP donation, the former judge looking to unseat the Democratic incumbent this November received $5,000 from the Chicago Police Sergeants Association PAC Fund at the end of July, records show.
“Kim Foxx doesn’t have the experience or judgment to run an office I think in regular times, and in times where there are events which obviously would test anyone, she certainly has failed that test,” O’Brien said. “There certainly is more of a feeling that I’m getting from business leaders and from individuals that they are sick and tired of favoring the criminal at the expense of the victim of crime, and that they’re ready and willing and able to elect a Republican for state’s attorney.”
Foxx’s senior campaign adviser Alex Sims dismissed the police union’s endorsement and attacked both O’Brien and the FOP. Sims said she was “not at all surprised” by the move and criticized O’Brien for his involvement as lead prosecutor in the wrongful conviction of a group of men in the 1986 murder of medical student Lori Roscetti.
In a phone interview, O’Brien said his office based its procedure on confessions and testimonies available at the time. But he agreed with the later DNA testing that found the men were innocent.
“I don’t know what it is that she wants to accuse me of. I did exactly what a prosecutor would do,” O’Brien said. “I prosecuted the evidence that was in front of me.”
FOP President John Catanzara said he finds it “rather rich” that Foxx is criticizing the union when she espouses what he described as a “do as I say, not as I do politics.”
“Pat O’Brien is gonna make a phenomenal state’s attorney,” Catanzara said. “Everybody has questionable decisions in their past that they have to answer, whatever the case may be. … There is no such thing as a perfect candidate, but I gotta tell you, I think if I had a law license, I’d be a better candidate than Kim Foxx. She’s that bad.”
Catanzara added that the $57,800 donation, the maximum a political fund can give, is a sign of what’s to come for the FOP’s political action committee. He said in a year’s time, he hopes the union will have a sevenfigure PAC fund after making more maximum contributions to bolster politicians who are friendly to FOP causes.
Still, O’Brien faces uncertain odds in a Democraticdominated county that could be energized to vote in the race between former Vice President Joe Biden, a Democrat, and President Donald Trump, a Republican. But Foxx has been panned by critics for this year’s surge in gun violence and summer lootings, as well as for a special prosecutor report that found “abuses of discretion” but no criminal wrongdoing in the Jussie Smollett case.
At the close of the second quarter, on June 30, O’Brien had less funds on hand than Foxx: $31,481.25 to her $43,280.61, records show. But from the day after the March 17 primary until Thursday, O’Brien reported almost $80,000 more in contributions, which includes the FOP donation. O’Brien said in addition, he has about $100,000 in checks that he has yet to cash as well as a pledge from Guaranteed Rate CEO Victor Ciardelli to raise at least another $100,000.
Still, Foxx beat out her Democratic challenger Bill Conway this year despite him outspending her. Endorsed by Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle and several former 2020 Democratic presidential candidates, Foxx survived attacks during the primary campaign over her office’s handling of the case against Smollett, an actor accused of faking a hate crime against himself last year.
O’Brien wasted no time in slamming Foxx after special prosecutor Dan Webb released his report stating her office misled the public on the Smollett deal. He also is pushing a narrative that Foxx is “soft-on-crime,” echoing criticism from Chicago police’s upper brass that her office does not prosecute offenders enough.
Although there have been anti-police protesters calling for criminal justice system reforms more in line with what Foxx has championed, O’Brien said Foxx in fact “should be worried about the growing movement of people that don’t take to the streets or are fed up with a city that has to raise its drawbridges in order to protect itself, because the state’s attorney won’t.” He was referring to this month’s lootings that prompted Lightfoot to raise the bridges downtown.
Foxx has rejected the characterization that she’s to blame for any increase in crime, especially in the wake of political fingerpointing following this summer’s lootings. Her office said it approved charges for nearly all looting-related felony arrests. “It does not serve us to have dishonest blame games when all of our hearts are breaking by what we are seeing,” she said during a news conference this month.