Illinois’ highest court put Rahm Emanuel, the former chief aide to US President Barack Obama, back in the race for Chicago mayor on Thursday, three days after a lower court threw him off the ballot because he had not lived in the city for a full year.
The state Supreme Court ruled unanimously in Emanuel’s favor, with a majority of justices concluding that the earlier decision was “without any foundation” in law because it said a candidate must be physically present in Chicago.
“As I said from the beginning, I think the voters deserve the right to make the choice of who should be mayor,” Emanuel said shortly after getting word of the high court’s action. “I’m relieved for the city. I’m relieved for the voters because they need the certainty that’s important for them.”
Emanuel lived for nearly two years in Washington working for Obama. He moved back to Chicago in October, after Chicago Mayor Richard Daley announced he would not seek another term and soon became the heavy favorite to lead the nation’s third-largest city. He has also raised more money than any other candidate.
After learning of Thursday’s decision, Emanuel said he took a congratulatory call from his old boss, the president.
Political observers said the ruling resurrecting Emanuel’s candidacy would probably give him added momentum heading into the last month of the campaign.
Don Rose, a long-time analyst of Chicago politics, said the saga would bring Emanuel “even greater sympathy” and could lift him to victory.
However, if Emanuel does not get more than 50 percent of the vote on Feb. 22, a runoff election could be more difficult to win against a single rival instead of the five he faces now.
Emanuel never stopped campaigning as the case unfolded.
The former White House chief of staff has said he always intended to return to Chicago and his arguments were accepted by the city election board and a Cook County judge before the appeals court rejected them.
The Supreme Court took special note of Emanuel’s testimony before the election board in which he listed all the personal items he left in his Chicago house, which he rented out after moving to Washington. The belongings included his wife’s wedding dress, photographs of his children and clothes they wore as newborns.
The board “determined that, in this situation, the rental did not show abandonment of the residence,” the court wrote in the main opinion. “This conclusion was well supported by the evidence and was not clearly erroneous.”
In an opinion that was unusually critical of the appellate ruling, the justices said Illinois’ residency law “has been consistent on the matter since at least the 19th century.”
Chicago-based election attorney Adam Lasker said he was surprised by Thursday’s decision because the reasoning behind the lower court ruling was sound. He surmised that “there was a lot of pressure from the public.”
Monday’s surprise ruling kicking Emanuel off the ballot threw the mayoral race into disarray. The following day, the state Supreme Court ordered Chicago elections officials to stop printing ballots without Emanuel’s name on them. Nearly 300,000 ballots had been printed before they stopped.
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