Do we like them?Do we like Brandon Johnson?
Our score: 6 out of 10. A solid record on LGBTQ+ issues and migrants, set against contested positions and ugly management fights, with no finding yet on the open questions.
Brandon Johnson came up through the classroom and the union, not the establishment. He taught in Chicago schools, became an organiser with the Chicago Teachers Union in 2011 and then won a Cook County board seat in 2018. His father was a pastor, and he grew up in a big family steeped in church and gospel music.
The best-known chapter of his time as mayor came in May 2025, when he told a church crowd about the Black officials in his administration. The US Justice Department opened a civil rights investigation into Chicago's hiring, citing those remarks. Johnson said he would not apologise for who his team are, and his office released a staff breakdown showing it is 34.3 per cent Black and 30.5 per cent White. The reports we read show no findings, and where you land depends on whether you see a political stunt or a fair question.
On the harm check, the record we found leans the right way. In January 2026 he appointed Chicago's first director of LGBTQ+ affairs, a promise he had made to the community, though the job reportedly comes with no budget or staff. We found no harmful words of his own about trans people, women or the climate, and nothing in our searches suggested he keeps harmful company. The Hasan Piker livestream drew criticism from his own side, but that is a political-risk story, not a harm story.
His January 2024 tiebreaking vote for a Gaza ceasefire resolution split people. The Jewish United Fund said it was appalled he helped pass it and called the resolution one-sided, while supporters of the vote deny it was anti-Israel. Whether you read it as a call for peace or as a one-sided move depends on your view of that war, and we are leaving it there.
The management side is messier. In March 2026 Johnson fired his deputy mayor for public safety, Garien Gatewood. Gatewood and another fired official alleged they were dismissed for holding people accountable, and said they had filed a hostile work environment complaint with the inspector general. Johnson said he could not speak to why someone makes a claim, and said the change was about making sure his vision gets carried out. Nothing has been decided, so treat it as allegation versus denial.
Politically, he is in a tough spot. In February he went on Hasan Piker's livestream and blamed corporate media and some Democrats for blocking his agenda. Local analysts said it risked pushing him further from voters who don't share his politics, and that he has problems with his own base. He still launched his reelection campaign in September 2026.