Most Chicagoans Think Rahm Emanuel Is Unfit To Serve Another Term. Surprised?

If you read DWT with any regularity, you already know that not all the worst villains in American politics are Republicans. And even worse than bungling junior crooks like Steve Israel, Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Joe Crowley, is the slimy gonif the three of them emulate and aspire to replicate. Yes, our old friend Rahm Emanuel! I must admit I wasn't disappointed to read in yesterday's Chicago Sun-Times that the slimy little Emanuel is staring well-earned reelection defeat right in the face. About 20% of Chicago votes think he's doing a better job as mayor than Richard Daley did and "only 29 percent would support him if the mayoral election were held today." He's not connecting with the voters and the pollster says he will lose his job unless he turns that around.

Emanuel is raising campaign cash at a frenzied pace-- with more than $7 million in the bank already and former President Bill Clinton headlining a mega-fundraiser next month-- in hopes of scaring off serious challengers.

He’d better hope the strategy works, according to the new poll, which measured Emanuel’s support against County Board President Toni Preckwinkle-- the challenger City Hall fears most-- along with three others: Ald. Bob Fioretti (2nd); Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis and former Ald. Robert Shaw (9th).

Shaw is the only declared mayoral challenger.

If the election were held today, Emanuel would find himself in a horse race.

The mayor would get 29 percent of the vote to Preckwinkle’s 26 percent. The poll shows Lewis finishing third with 10 percent, followed by Fioretti at 5 percent and Shaw with 3 percent. An estimated 27 percent of voters interviewed were undecided.

The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.2 percentage points, higher when the results are broken down by demographic factors. More than 39 percent of respondents were interviewed on their cellphones.

Emanuel has alienated African-American voters who helped put him in office by instigating Chicago’s first teachers strike in 25 years, closing 50 public schools, opening new charter schools and unveiling plans to build new schools and school additions, with the educational largesse heavily concentrated on the North Side.

That includes a $14 million addition to Walter Payton College Prep and a new, $60 million selective-enrollment high school nearby named after President Barack Obama, whose 2011 endorsement of his former White House chief of staff sealed the deal with black voters.

The political fallout of those actions and persistent crime showed in the new poll.

Among African-American voters surveyed, Emanuel gets 8 percent, barely above the 3 percent registered by Fioretti and Shaw. Preckwinkle got 35 percent. Lewis scored 16 percent.

Another warning sign is the mayor’s meager 2 percent showing among Hispanics, Chicago’s fastest-growing demographic group, compared with Preckwinkle’s 40 percent.

…Emanuel’s political strength is among white voters, where he holds a more than 3-to-1 margin over Preckwinkle and among voters 60 and older, where the margin is better than 2-to-1.

Daley’s support for Emanuel was an open secret at City Hall, even though Chicago’s longest-serving mayor publicly professed neutrality after his surprise decision to retire from politics.

But since taking office, Emanuel has criticized, abandoned and even ridiculed many of the policies proposed by his predecessor and political mentor.

Most of all, Emanuel has blamed Daley-- without mentioning the former mayor by name-- for the widely despised parking meter deal, for the financial time bombs left behind at City Hall and Chicago Public Schools, and for failing to solve the $20 billion pension crisis that has prompted a Wall Street rating agency to drop Chicago’s bond rating four notches in eight months.

That’s what makes results of the Daley-Emanuel comparison question so surprising.

Asked whether Emanuel was doing a better job running the city than Daley did, 51 percent of voters surveyed said no, 18 percent said yes and 25 percent said the two were “about the same.”

McKeon said what surprised him most about the poll was “how competitive” Preckwinkle is and the level of anger directed at Emanuel. A few people stated, “Just pick anybody but Rahm,” the pollster said.

“The problem is, he’s trying to make this an international city, and it’s a local city. That’s why they like Daley more,” McKeon said.

“All Daley ever talked about was neighborhoods. He’d drive around the city with his notepad. That’s who he was and what the city has been. Rahm’s agenda is just not selling right now. He’d better prioritize what the people want-- not what he thinks they want.”

McKeon noted that the 2011 mayoral election featured the “lowest black turnout they’ve had in forever” in Chicago. The stage is set for just the opposite in 2015, the poll shows.

“The African-American community is galvanized on schools and crime,” McKeon said.

Preckwinkle has been "the most outspoken critic of the mayor’s school closings, charter openings, school budget cuts and the seven-day teachers strike that Emanuel’s bullying missteps helped to instigate." But she's far from the only one criticizing Emanuel, his agenda and his ruthlessness. Last month, Fioretti accused Emanuel of presiding over the “widening of Chicago into two cities” and Lewis stood toe-to-toe with Emanuel and emerged from the 2012 teachers strike as a folk hero who got the best of the mayor. Lewis derides him as "the murder mayor." If he looked unelectable as mayor, he could always cuts a deal and run against Republican Senator Mark Kirk in 2015 instead-- better for Chicago but much, much worse for America.