Chicago Mayor Johnson Uses Fourth Veto to Block Debt-Threshold Ordinance; Override Vote Looms
Chicago is a city in Cook County, Illinois. Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson on October 9 used his fourth veto to kill a City Council ordinance that would require a 30-vote supermajority to approve city borrowing, instead of the current simple majority. The Council will try next week to override the veto with 34 votes, setting up a City Hall showdown.
The reform, championed by retiring Ald. Marty Quinn (13th), passed the Council 32-15 on September 29. In his veto letter to the city clerk, Johnson wrote: "Neighborhoods with the greatest infrastructure needs should not face additional barriers to securing essential public investment." He warned that delaying infrastructure projects "can increase construction costs, worsen deterioration and ultimately cost taxpayers more."
Johnson also noted the 30-vote threshold is higher than the 26 votes needed to approve the city's $16.6 billion budget "or any other critical matter that comes before this body." He had previously branded the measure a "three-fifths compromise," invoking the constitutional clause that once counted enslaved Black people as three-fifths of a person — even though several Black aldermen, including Finance Committee Chair Pat Dowell, voted for it.
Quinn expected the veto and conceded that reaching the 34 votes needed for an override would be "a reach" — he already failed once to override Johnson's veto of a hemp-sales ban. But Quinn said Friday he would try anyway, targeting three aldermen who left before the September 29 roll call: Daniel La Spata (1st), Chris Taliaferro (29th) and Andre Vasquez (40th).
The fight comes at a sensitive moment in Chicago's 2026 budget battle: the Council's $16.6 billion "alternative" budget, including legalized video gaming terminals, takes effect January 1 after Johnson let it become law without his signature. The debt-threshold fight is the latest round in the struggle over fiscal discipline versus infrastructure investment. According to Chicago local media reports on October 10, the override vote is expected next week and will set the borrowing rules for America's third-largest city.
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 芝加哥市政厅正门现状，ajay_suresh 摄，CC BY 2.0（Wikimedia Commons）
