SALON

Monday, Jan 24, 2011 6:45 PM UTC

Rahm Emanuel, victim of Chicago-style politics, thrown off mayoral ballot

Whoops! An Illinois court says the former White House chief of staff gave up his city residency

By

Topics: Rahm Emanuel, War Room, Chicago,

Rahm Emanuel, victim of Chicago-style politics, thrown off mayoral ballotRahm Emanuel, chief of staff for President-elect Barack Obama, addresses a gathering of corporate CEOs at an economic conference sponsored by The Wall Street Journal, at the Four Seasons Hotel in Washington, Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2008. Emanuel was a senior advisor to President Bill Clinton and has represented the Fifth Congressional District of Illinois in the House of Representatives since 2002. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)(Credit: Associated Press)

Rahm Emanuel has been kicked off the ballot for mayor of Chicago. Between that and the Bears’ humiliating loss yesterday, this has probably been his worst 24-hour period in years. Even after the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners and a Cook County judge said Emanuel met the residency requirements, the Illinois Appellate Court ruled 2-1 today that Emanuel gave up his residency when he took the White House chief of staff job and rented out his apartment to that guy who refused to give it back to him.

With the election on Feb. 22, Emanuel is now excluded from the ballot unless his appeal to the Illinois Supreme Court is successful. (Which actually seems unlikely.)

I’m no huge fan of Emanuel, who pioneered cashing in on years of “public service” in a Democratic administration with a shameless stopover to become a millionaire in the finance industry, and who then helped make a complete mess of the Obama administration’s first two years, but this is still silly. The man has spent most of his life in Chicago, and taking a job in D.C. for a couple of years shouldn’t disqualify him from running for mayor any more than being from Boston makes Mike Bloomberg unqualified to lead New York. If the good people of Chicago are dumb enough to want to make Emanuel their leader, they should have that right.

What is especially entertaining about this whole mess is that Rahm Emanuel himself is now the victim of genuine “Chicago-style politics,” just as it exists in the fevered imaginations of conservative bloggers. Getting your opponents thrown off the ballot is a time-honored Chicago tradition, and if you can’t out-fundraise Emanuel (and no one can), your best hope is to disqualify him. The attorney waging war on Emanuel, Burt Odelson, “represents” two voters, but no one is positive who actually set him loose on Emanuel. (Though there are theories.)

If the Supreme Court fails him, Emanuel’s best hope is a write-in campaign. He’s currently polling well above his rivals, and he’s got both the money and the insane driving relentless will to crush all who stand in his way, so I wouldn’t count him out yet.

Alex Pareene

Alex Pareene writes about politics for Salon and is the author of "The Rude Guide to Mitt." Email him at apareene@salon.com and follow him on Twitter @pareene More Alex Pareene.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 52 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Paul Krugman’s right: Austerity kills. "In an economy where we’re all in the same boat, one person’s spending is another person’s income. So when the government cuts spending, it reduces people’s income, leading to less business, more unemployment, and a vicious spiral of slowing down the economy."
252 points253 points | 226 comments
vote
FBI reportedly joins Bachmann campaign finance probe
243 points244 points | 17 comments
vote
Jon Karl makes things worse: He regrets “inaccurate” Benghazi email but says his story based on it “still entirely stands.” Really. ABC News?
206 points207 points | 31 comments
vote
“Jodorowsky’s Dune”: The sci-fi classic that never was.
77 points78 points | 16 comments
vote
Austerity Kills: Brian McArdle, a 57-year-old man who had had two strokes and could barely walk, was found "fit for work" by a government subcontractor, and had his benefits stopped. He died the next day.
71 points72 points | 5 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations