I Said What I Said: Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot Defends Decision to Grant Exclusive Interviews to Journalists of Color

'So the absence of journalists of color, covering the mayor of the third-largest city in the country is absolutely unacceptable,' Lightfoot said.

Listen, Lori Lightfoot is a lot of things. She is the first openly gay, African-American woman to serve as Chicagoโ€™s 56th mayor. She is the first mayor to show up to a press conference dressed as โ€œRona Destroyer.โ€ And she was the first political official to tell kids to stay their ass in the house because their jump shot is always going to be weak.

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So did it surprise anyone when Lightfoot noted in May that she would only be granting interview requests with minority journalists? Or, would it shock anyone to learn that she doubled down on that statement as she called the number of non-white journalists covering her unacceptable?

โ€œI would absolutely do it again. Iโ€™m unapologetic about it because it spurred a very important conversation, a conversation that needed to happen, that should have happened a long time ago,โ€ Lightfoot told the New York Times.

โ€œHere is the bottom line for me: to state the obvious, Iโ€™m a Black woman mayor. Iโ€™m the mayor of the third-largest city in the country, obviously I have a platform, and itโ€™s important to me to advocate on things that I believe are important,โ€ Lightfoot said.

โ€œGoing back to why I ran, to disrupt the status quo. The media is critically important to our democracyโ€ฆthe media is in a time of incredible upheaval and disruption but our city hall press corps looks like itโ€™s 1950 or 1970,โ€ she added.

Lightfoot said that the motive wasnโ€™t to exclude folks, but a push to get newsrooms โ€œfocused on diversity.โ€

โ€œIn Chicago, we have a huge amount of diverse media talent. Weโ€™ve got schools that...that are best in class across the country, and I would say, really, across the world,โ€ she said.

โ€œSo the absence of journalists of color, covering the mayor of the third-largest city in the country is absolutely unacceptable. And so I decided to say something about it,โ€ the mayor added.

Lightfoot did note that politicians shouldnโ€™t be able to determine who covers them.

โ€œNo, itโ€™s not about me choosing who covers me, right? I gave exclusive interviews. And we do get to choose who we talk to in exclusives. I gave exclusive interviews with journalists of color, right?โ€ she said.

โ€œOne 24-hour period and it was like peopleโ€™s heads exploded. I had journalists saying, โ€˜Does the mayor think Iโ€™m racist?โ€™ No, itโ€™s not about individuals. Itโ€™s about systemic racism,โ€ the mayor added.

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