DNC Host City Chicago: Murder Capital of America

By John Kass | Aug 23, 2024

At their national convention in Chicago, Democrats have been busy shoveling legitimate criticism about the Biden Harris administration into the Memory Hole:

The Democrat’s Open Borders are shoveled in there, and the 15 million illegal migrants who swamp the blue cities, taking resources from Americans.

And the Biden Harris inflation is stuffed into the Memory Hole too, inflation that drives food prices up and up so that many American families can’t afford Happy Meals for their kids.

But one more thing they’ve had trouble stuffing into the Memory Hole:

The bodies of Chicago’s murdered dead.

We know it now thanks to the independent research group wirepoints.org. The Chicago media isn’t much interested.

Chicago is the murder capital of the United States.

You might want to read the story. Here’s the link to the story written by Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner:

Chicago led nation in homicides for 12th year in a row in 2023, murder rate still 5 times higher than NYC’s – Wirepoints | Wirepoints

The Democrat Party plays the race card at their national convention and so do the Chicago Democrats.  They have no shame. Chicago has a thoroughly failed black mayor incapacitated by panic attacks, a black Cook County State’s Attorney, a black chief judge, a black police chief, a black Cook County board president who doubles as the woman who selects liberal judges, and still they’re hungry for more race cards. And the media thrills to it, and helps them and protects them.

Chicago is also the home of epic race hustler Jesse Jackson, famous for his Budweiser boycott and using his racist politics to leveraging his kids into a lucrative Budweiser beer distributorship. Chicago is also the home of former President Barack Obama, who met the notorious bagman Tony Rezko here.

Obama once tried to rise up and over the cheap race politics of Jackson by addressing the lack of fathers in what media calls “the black community,” but Jackson had a fit and Obama backed down. It was Jackson who hissed –on a FOX News hot mike –that Obama should be castrated like a hog. And Obama shut up about the father issue, or made it somewhat more palatable to Jackson and the race hustlers, and so Obama became a hustler himself. The Obamas who came into the presidency with nothing now sit on $75 million of real estate, the mansion in Washington and Hawaii and  Martha’s Vineyard for example, where illegal migrants were hugged and then pushed on buses and kicked out so quickly that their heads were spinning.

The Democrat race hustlers targeted police officers as enemies of the state, and argued that arresting violent offenders was racist because most of the offenders were minorities. And so, after decades of Democrat rule, after years of installing soft-on-crime prosecutors, soft-on-crime criminal judges, all of it directed by left wing Democrat boss Toni Preckwinkle, as Gov. Fat Boy ate his fears and was so terrified that he sucked up to black racists and BLM activists by getting rid of cash bail. And naturally, the predictable happened.

Since prosecutors didn’t prosecute, cops stopped making arrests. Killers kept getting released to kill again. Witnesses gave up wanting to talk. And predictably, the traditions of law-and-order in Chicago have broken down completely.

Democrats wanted black votes, and convinced black voters that law enforcement was racist. And they convinced angry white white women of the left that law enforcement was  racist. And the victims of repeat violent offenders, many of them also women, were brushed aside.

We reap what we sow.

The great Heather Mac Donald of the Manhattan Institute explained must of this in her riveting essay “Chicago Crime and Democratic Values” in the Wall Street Journal before the convention.

“Over the four-day holiday weekend in Chicago, 19 people were fatally shot and more than 100 wounded by gunfire,” she wrote. “One of them, 8-year-old Bryson Orr, was killed along with two women in a drive-by shooting. This wasn’t unusual. On Memorial Day weekend, 10 people lost their lives to gun violence, including 5-year-old Reign Ware. On Father’s Day weekend, more than 70 people were shot and eight killed. The child victims this summer include 7-year-old Jai’Mani Amir Rivera, fatally shot in the chest while walking to a neighbor’s house on June 18. A 3-month-old boy named Jemimah—his parents, fearing for their safety, have kept the family name out of the news—was shot in the chest on July 27 while riding in a car and remains in critical condition. On Thursday, a 3-year-old boy was grazed by a bullet fired by an adversary of his father.”

The dead children are swept away in Chicago’s river of violence. Most of the victims are black and Latino. The race-baiting Democratic hacks got to play the race card for votes, portraying it all as white racism. But the victims who are also minorities. They don’t vote. And they’re impervious to racial politics. So they’re forgotten.

Those of us who care about crime in Chicago and the people who live there—bitter retired cops and broken-down Chicago reporters like me and retired assistant Cook County State’s Attorneys with ulcers–have few places to go.

We can’t go to the Chicago newspapers, which once covered crime as a public service.

But now the papers have gone woke. Much of Chicago print media won’t carry mug shots of alleged criminals—who are often released from jail before they go out and shoot others— because many criminals tend to be minorities and journalists are white and woke and afraid of leftist activists. And so they look for sand in which to bury their heads.

One place I go to find real news is to heyjackass.com. And another is the superbly reported crime news site, CWB Chicago.

There are many reasons why the rule of law has broken down in Chicago.

Some of you know why, others don’t. For those without a clue, you should know that left wing billionaire George Soros, whom I dared criticize when I was lead columnist at “the paper” had elected do-nothing Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx.

For criticizing Soros I was defamed and publicly humiliated by “the paper” and the neo-Marxist newspaper guild that controlled the newsroom.

What was my sin?

Writing the truth about my hometown. I asked a question: What happened to an America where you could freely speak your mind?

“The larger question is not about me, or the political left that hopes to silence people like me,” I said, “but about America and its young. Those of us targeted by cancel culture are not only victims. We are examples, as French revolutionaries once said, in order to encourage the others.

“Human beings do not wish to see themselves as cowards. They want to see themselves as heroes.

“And, as they are shaped and taught to fear even the slightest accusation of thought crime, they will not view themselves as weak for falling in line. Instead they will view themselves as virtuous. And that is the sin of it. Those who do not behave will be marginalized. But those who self-censor will be praised.”

I couldn’t take it. My stomach kept turning in disgust for what had happened to journalism and to the Chicago media. Once ‘the paper’ offered me a buyout I took it. If I had stayed, I’d have been stabbed in the back. And so I left and started my own website here, at johnkassnews.com. Like the neo-Marxists keep chanting mindlessly at their Chicago convention, “We’re not going back.”

Exactly.

The inconvenient truths about Chicago and crime and lawlessness are obliterated as the Democrats and all their allies in corrupt corporate media. They hope all this will be forgotten because the Chicago media stuffs the inconvenient truths down into the Memory Hole.

“Democrat-led Chicago earned the disturbing title of America’s murder capital for the 12th year running in 2023 — as homicides have surged almost 50% from a decade ago, according to troubling data,” reported the New York Post. “At least 617 people were murdered across Chicago — where the Democratic National Convention kicks off Monday — in 2023, compared to 416 killed 10 years ago in 2013, recent statistics from the research group Wirepoints.org found.”

That kill count put Chicago ahead of every city in the country for the 12th year in a row — beating out Philadelphia’s 408 murders last year, and New York City’s 386 homicides.

If the Democrats were as interested in justice as they boast, they would have carved out a special evening of tribute for Boss Toni Preckwinkle and Kamala Harris’ Soros sister Kim Foxx.

But everyone in Chicago knows what the Democrats have done to them and for them. And one more thing about the host Democrat city.

If Soros Sister Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are elected in November, one thing is certain.

The Chicago Way becomes the American Way. God help us.

-30-

About the author: John Kass spent decades as a political writer and news columnist in Chicago working at a major metropolitan newspaper. He is co-host of The Chicago Way podcast. And he just loves his “No Chumbolone” hat, because johnkassnews.com is a “No Chumbolone” Zone where you can always get a cup of common sense.

Comments 39

  1. Like Jeremiah, “the weeping prophet,” John, you have poured forth the Chicago litany of pain and anguish echoing the wailing of the survivors of the victims.

    Like Jeremiah you tell those who will not hear that “violence and outrage is my message.” There is no hope and joy in death, nor in the celebration of death.

    The comfortable and the satisfied will not listen. I pray that those who go along with the comfortable and the satisfied will change direction, stiffen their spines and vote against the leaders of woe. There is no joy coming our way.

  2. Chicago is so racist and discriminatory, there are no white males in leadership positions. I can’t believe how racist and discriminatory and sexist the United States has become. I mean, Oprah only made $3 billion. Gee whiz, what a terrible country.

  3. When I look at the stories on the murder stats, what is NEVER mentioned is that the technology and skills available to our CFD/EMS folks are getting better. More lives are being stabilized in the field and transported to Stroger AKA “County”, UIC and the numerous other hospital ED’s that are trauma centers. The docs/nurses/techs there are saving more lives so the death stats are not skyrocketing as they would. The GSW and other slaughter methods are putting more into rehab who then are confined to crutches or powered wheel chairs or a mechanized bed or other device. You only need look to the fact that the County Board is needing to build a new and larger morgue. Granted the current one opened 46 years ago and added room is needed for tech but more importantly will be storage space in the cooler, office for added forensic pathologists (if they can be found-three pathology residents and none pursuing forensic pathology graduated from my stepdaughters UIC medical school class half a dozen years ago.) Look at the stats from the Stein Institute (the current morgue). Talk to the overworked docs.

    Last night was lots of happy talk and no substance. Kamala’s role as “Border Czar” never mentioned and “Coach Walz” who was a D coach on an 8th grade team getting tossed off for a DUI, not to mention letting Minneapolis burn again destroying businesses in the black community and his inflating of his NG rank and retiring just before his unit would really go “in country”. Those are the real Kamala and Coach show.

    1. Mr. Kenney

      I worked in the city from 1980 to 2016, in law enforcement.

      To the day I die, I preach this to any one who will listen.

      The Chicago Fire Department has the greatest paramedics in the world.
      The hardest city workers in Chicago are Chicago Fire Dept Paramedics.
      I could write a book about the saves these great people made under the worse conditions imaginable..

      Also we are blessed by the doctors, nurses, medical staff, at the trauma centers.
      County aka St. Rodgers, Northwestern, and Christ, are modern day miracle workers.

      Great column JK, great responses from your loyal readers..

  4. There’s a sick circularity to Democrats’ ruination of Chicago. The city’s best journalist is hounded to leave his job by the Chicago Politburo’s bogus charges of anti-semitism as the party adopts pro-Hamas anti-semitism. And the Chicago Politburo blames racism (white) for virtually everything, while nurturing policy racism (black) that turns Chicago into a killing field for minorities.

    They’re “not going back,” no. They’re going around in murderous circles.

  5. Long time reader and first time posting.
    What we never hear about is the enormous medical cost of those shot who survive. What is the life- long cost of a spinal injury? What are those numbers for the uninsured gangbanger?

    BTW-Love the website, John

  6. I don’t know John…It was a real Lovefest…only 22 people shot in Chicago during the whirlwind romance at the United Center. The real funny thing is when we have a particularly bloody weekend local television will lead the nightly news report on violence in Gary, Dolton, Harvey…anywhere BUT Chicago. Forty people shot, 10 dead on Chicago but they tell me about a guy shot in GARY INDIANA. Yes, nothing to see here. Keep moving…

  7. Chicago crime, ‘woke’, Soros, bitterness at being fired from the Trib, blah, blah, how many times are you going to write the same column?? World Population Review (non-partisan) has Chicago at #10, behind cities like Las Vegas, Memphis and New Orleans. CBS news puts Chicago #28, behind cities like Little Rock, Columbia and Dayton. Overall crime rates are receding after spiking post covid. Yes, crime and safety are legitimate issues, but the scare tactics Trump employees and his minions repeat no longer ‘scare’ anyone, except all the retirees who left during the Daley administration and read this column from their balcony in Boca Raton. Come back and see for yourself. Grab a ticket for a Sox game (plenty available..). Walk around Bridgeport. Take the Red Line. Grab some Pizza at Oggi’s Bakery on Grand. Stop lobbing stink bombs from out of state. Oh, you might want to consider a more legitimate news source than “heyjackass.com.”

    1. There’s a new policy. no fake names for commentators. no pathetic weasels smearing rigatoni over it either to “courageously” hide their identity. and if they violate standards and become abusive, they’ll be put in the penalty box for a month. one post per commentator. newspapers don’t allow multiple anonymous comment and neither do we.
      capisce?

      1. I’ve tried several times to change my name via my account but this portal won’t update it, so not my fault. Moreover I’m not the only reader under a pseudonym who posts often, I just happen to be the one with an alternate POV, which must frustrate you mio buon amico. If you can tell me how to update my name as a commenter, happy to do so. I have nothing to hide.

        1. You, Tony Cesare, a.k.a Senor Grande, have a lot to hide:
          1) You are serial identity thief. I know it. You know it.
          2) You are an abject coward. That’s why you hide behind your multiple fake names.
          3) Strange, isn’t it? You had little trouble hiding behind Rigatoni when Tony Cesare was called out. You had no trouble hiding behind Senor Grande like a “cockroach in a gas station urinal” as Kass call you.
          Your lies are so thinly veiled. They can be seen across the galaxy.
          Several of us are having tons of fun discussing your lies and identity thievery on other sites. You will never see that. But we love it.

          2. Saaay..didn’t you used to be David R Pearling?? Where did the “R ” go?? Who are you REALLY?? Fake name then or now?? Hmmm…

        2. Nothing to hide? Curious. Tony did you not at one time claim (on your prior FB page) that you were the bartender, cook, bouncer and proprietor of Tony’s Tap in Mineral Point WI? In fact that was not true. Correct? I mean the answer is either a “yes” or a “no”. If “yes”, is that not identity theft – or an attempt at identity theft? If “no” – then what you call it?

          1. Check my FB page, same as it’s always been. I’m the bartender, cook, bouncer and proprietor (not in that order..) of Tony’s Tap. We are nestled on the brilliant shores East of Lake Pearling, near downtown Kleintown. I’ve never been to Mineral Point, but I pity the owner for having a creep like David R harass him. You are welcome here anytime Bruce. (: Sincerely.

  8. John,
    Good reminder of Chicago’s place as a murder capital for the country and what drives it. What we are seeing is what happens when a generation of people in a place are never taught about the importance of tgere being a God, and that humans have been given the Imago Dei – Image of God! Chicago is slowly descending into the abyss of the godlessness we read about in Genesis 6, where “the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually”! Why did God tell the Israelites in the 10 commandments, “You shall not murder”? A society cannot survive if intentional or negligent homicide is tolerated. Likewise, “You shall not steal” – respecting another’s property- is also crucial to civil society. The Progressive toleration of these occurring rampantly and ignoring them and those who do such actions as “victims” displays how far they have moved toward the anarchy and de-civilized “survival of the fittest” mentality they have embraced, but don’t explain to their adherents. Those who support, vote for, and follow them will truly reap what they have sown! I sorrow for the innocent children killed, maimed or raised in such an environment as Chicago is becoming. It is truth that can set us free, but Progressivism promotes lies and deceives those who adhere to it!

  9. As always, I thank you ever so much John Kass for your words. I have saved all the links that you put forward in this column for getting truth and facts from them and God bless you for sharing this information.
    Yes, God forbid, if Chicago and our area reverts to the death throes of California’s golden images of collapse. I am too old to not care and too immobile as I only dabble in putting words and reposting from what some of my “idols of journalists” put forward. It really sticks in my craw what the younger generations are allowing to happen in watching it happen while zipping their lips and closing their eyes and ears. I guess our old guard is getting older and not being listened to as to the history that foments this disaster.
    Now I am getting long in words…..thank you again John Kass for pushing my buttons and hoping that your words will bring some sunlight to those who are blinded by bull feces.
    Tom

    1. Nice management, John. Self-righteous left-wing weasels are everywhere and laughable. Self-righteous left-wing weasels who are pseudonymous cowards squeaking gutter insults are not funny and should be quarantined from intelligent discussion. They have plenty of fellow weasels with whom they can squeak.

        1. John, make this nitwit Rigabaloney pay for a subscription to post. I’m sure his mom won’t give him the money to pay for it. Then again maybe he can pick up another shift at Wendy’s.

          2. I’ve always been partial to Culver’s, the ButterBurger (smash burger style) is top notch, you should try it.

          3. Oh, and for the record, I am a paying subscriber. I do intend to delete my current account and re-subscribe under my real name per John’s thoughtful new policy. Stay tuned.

        2. Here is the link to ironclad proof of Tony Cesare’s identity theft.
          He actually stated unequivocally that he was the proprietor of this establishment. It’s all here in living color.
          Then…after we exposed his ID theft he changed his Facebook page the next day.
          Worse…he lied and claimed that we fabricated his Facebook page.
          Is this sociopathic?
          We spoke to the actual owner of Tony’s Tap in Mineral Point, Wisconsin, and his wife. They have never heard of Tony Cesar’s…er…Senor Grande.

          Click this link or copy and paste for images of the ID theft attempt;

          https://www.gardendesignquickstartguide.com/2022/09/come-for-our-durp-burger.html?m=1

  11. Hey, John….those of us who look forward to your offerings in our electronic mailbox thoroughly enjoy reaping the benefits of your years of knowledge gained as you were part of what made Chicago’s heart beat. Almost all who have signed up to be part of the effort you present in this electronic forum enjoy the old art of conversation, the willingness to examine issues from the viewpoint of independent thought.

    From time to time, someone weasels into a civilized, considered conversation, happily belching out a bitter ugliness that many of us have been happy to separate ourselves from. Not sure if it is loneliness, lack of attention, festering wounds never allowed to fully heal, or just pain in parts where guys would prefer not to hurt…..who knows. Your fans, however, are just that – FANS. Not only of you, as a professional writer and thought leader, but fans of the kind of ethics and honesty you have promoted since many of us started reading your offerings a VERY, VERY long time ago. There are those few who would love nothing more than to finish the job they started on you at ‘the paper’.

    We hope you know that those who eagerly await what you have to offer as you observe the City and the world around you are pleased that you are willing to stand up today like you did the day you walked out of that tower. That is the man you are, the writer you are, the guy who can’t be bullied nor bought. If only we could have someone with those traits able to get elected to run Chicago and Cook County. The mind reels at the potential considering all that is here…..

  12. I think what makes Chicago an outlier is the comparison to its peers: the other two great American metropolises – NYC and LA. NYC being the great international city; LA being the “California Dreamin’ ”city of movie stars, palm trees and beaches, and Chicago being the great American city. Both NYC and LA are more populous – NYC in fact over three times Chicago – and both have much less gun violence. In fact if I recall Chicago’s homicide rate is three times NYC despite one third the population. That is an embarrassment no matter how you cut it.

    The other issue: folks tend to focus on gunshot mortality but ignore those who were shot but survived as if all is good and they just go on with their lives. Well some do, but many do not. People don’t realize the long term psychic trauma, likely permanent neurologic debility – up to and including paraplegia and quadriplegia – chronic pain, and numerous other permanent gunshot relate disabilities that survivors often endure. And of course rarely if ever mentioned is the long term debilitating financial burden due to loss of employment and acute and continuing chronic medical care.

    It’s no secret who are responsible. John mentioned the whole infamous crew. It is a disgrace.

      1. Yes. I agree. You are correct. Of course they are responsible. I should have stated that “it is no secret who the enablers are.” The fact of the matter is that many criminals will not change their behavior so it is up to law enforcement and the justice system to initiate policies that will mitigate or modulate that destructive antisocial behavior and limit the danger to us every day folk (or do I now have to carry routinely?) … and not do the opposite by encouraging or exacerbating (as we are now presently doing) that danger. And yes, there are many strategies – “stop and frisk” “broken windows” – that are available, successful, but subjected to constitutional scrutiny. But there are others too that can be tried that will pass constitutional muster. My point is, what we are now doing in Chicago is counterproductive – enabled by the folks John mentioned – and encourages criminal behavior rather than deters. That’s all I’m saying.

        1. Mr. Kleinman – I agree with you there. I am all in for getting tougher on crime and that’s one of the areas where I agree with Trump. Liberal policies regarding crime in big cities is infuriating.
          No level of crime, especially violent crime is acceptable.
          What I object to is that Trump and some in the media (including this site) are grossly misleading the public about the level of crime in America today. Gaslighting works unfortunately.

          1. Mr. Lee. I guess the “level of crime” is in the eye of the beholder. What level is acceptable. Is Chicago at one third the population of NYC and five times the homicide rate (in 2022) acceptable. How about 2.5 x that of LA … which is less populous than NYC but more populous than Chicago? Is that grossly misleading comparing peer to peer? Is being pistol whipped on the near east side by a gang of teens “grossly misleading” especially when the police inform the victim that this is not unusual, it is the MO since the perps are likely all under 18 and face no serious consequences if caught (and that too is unlikely). Is that grossly misleading? How about a homicide rate of 3.2 per 100K on the north side of Chicago vs one of 114 in the Austin district and 148 in Garfield Park? Are those rates (analysis from the UofC crime lab of FBI data) grossly misleading? In fact those rates are right up there with one of the world’s most violent cities: Tijuana Mexico (at 138 per 100K). Is that also grossly misleading? If so, I wonder then. What would you consider NOT misleading?

  15. There is no Kleintown,Wisconsin. There is no Lake Pearling. There is no Riga-Tony. There is no Tony’s Tap other than the one in Mineral Point. There is a serial liar currently using the alias Senor Grande. What a mook.

    1. His actual name is Tony Cesare. He is a well known identity thief.
      Did you see that he intends to register his actual name here? Tony Cesare will be back.
      That will be delicious. His Facebook page where he lied about being the proprietor of Tony’s Tap in Mineral Point is under his actual name. It lines up exactly with our screenshots of his attempted ID theft.

  17. Mr. Kleinman- First of all I clearly stated in my last post that “no level of violent crime is acceptable” but maybe you missed it. I hate to type in all caps because there is another guy that does that “ALL THE TIME”.
    In your post above among other examples you said-
    “How about a homicide rate of 3.2 per 100K on the north side of Chicago vs one of 114 in the Austin district and 148 in Garfield Park?”

    Bruce- If you cherry pick you can always find crime hotspots (and low spots) somewhere. You can always find cities where the crime rate is recently up, and where it’s recently down. Nationwide though the trends have been overall improving.

    My previous point was two-fold-
    1) No level of violent crime is acceptable. We must strive for zero.
    2) Trump is grossly exaggerating the violent crime levels in America now when compared to the past. He does so, of course, for political purposes.

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