In a boost for morale, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot (D) is shelling out $5,000 for the winner of a city-wide karaoke contest. The prize comes as crime is surging in the Windy City.
If you have ever wanted to see Lightfoot shake her tailfeather, now is your chance because the leftist mayor announced the monthlong contest via a series of short videos across social media platforms this week.
As the American Firebrand PAC put it, Lightfoot “is fiddling while Rome burns.”
Viewer discretion is advised:
.@LoriLightfoot is fiddling while Rome burns. pic.twitter.com/U0oBDD4fMO
— American Firebrand (@FirebrandPAC) October 6, 2022
According to the government-crafted website, ChicagoSingsKaraoke.org, the contest is open to all Chicagoans aged 21 and above.
The “monthlong contest kicks off October 9 and will be an opportunity for amateur singers to showcase their musical chops in 18 neighborhood venues,” the website added. “After two rounds of a judged competition, the top performer will be crowned Chicago’s Karaoke Champion and receive $5,000.”
Lightfoot claims that karaoke is a “tradition” in the Windy City, “and every night of the week you can find remarkable performances in the unlikeliest of places.”
“And you haven’t lived until you’ve heard me cover some Chaka Khan,” she added.
Of course, crime is also a tried-and-true Chicago classic.
Just a few weeks ago, McDonald’s CEO Chris Kempczinski blasted the city for its handling of illicit behavior.
“Crime is seeping into every corner of our city,” Kempczinski said during an event at the Economic Club of Chicago in September.
“Everywhere I go, I’m confronted by the same question these days — what’s going on in Chicago?” the hamburger giant’s Big Cheese added. “While it may wound our civic pride to hear it, there is a general sense out there that our city is in crisis.”
According to the New York Post, the city has seen an 18% increase in robberies, 28% more burglaries, a 65% surge in thefts, and 66% more car thefts than at this point in 2021. Murder is down year-over-year, but is still high at 479 murders as of September 15.
“We have violent crime that’s happening in our restaurants … we’re seeing homelessness issues in our restaurants. We’re having drug overdoses that are happening in our restaurants,” Kempcenski said. “So we see in our restaurants, every single day, what’s happening in society at large.”
Much like her singing skills, Lightfoot is quite comfortable standing behind a podium and making a clown out of herself.
Over the summer, she told a reporter that questions about the city’s violence were coming from “right-wing nuts.”
“This is a great beautiful global city and the right-wing characterization of our city as something other than what it is, I categorically reject,” she said defiantly.
She also told the CEO of McDonald’s to “educate himself” in response to his comments.
On that note, perhaps Lightfoot can sing Elvis Presley’s 1969 hit song, “In the Ghetto,” during this year’s singing competition. It’s about a poor little baby born in Chicago who grows up in poverty and hunger, then as a teenager buys a gun, steals a car, and gets shot dead in the city’s streets, only for the cycle to continue as his mama cries.
Fifty years later and the more things change, the more they stay the same — but hey, break a leg at karaoke, Lightfoot!
The views expressed in this piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.