After video surfaced allegedly showing a group of Chicago police officers “lounging” in a congressman’s office as looters ransacked nearby businesses, Mayor Lori Lightfoot called it an “embarrassment” and pledged to identify the individuals and hold them accountable.
Lightfoot displayed still images, said be to taken from the video, at a news conference Thursday, standing alongside Rep. Bobby Rush, whose office was where the incident happened.
After video surfaced allegedly showing a group of Chicago police officers “lounging” in a congressman’s office as looters ransacked nearby businesses, Mayor Lori Lightfoot called it an “embarrassment” and pledged to identify the individuals and hold them accountable. (City of Chicago)
She said the images show the individuals taking a break in Rush’s office while small businesses were looted and burned -- and while their fellow officers were outside “getting bottles thrown at their heads” by rioters.
“That’s a personal embarrassment to me,” Lightfoot told Rush during her remarks. “I’m sorry that you and your staff even had to deal with this incredible indignity.”
ANNOUNCEMENT: Mayor Lightfoot joins the Chicago Police Department and U.S. Representative Bobby Rush to make an announcement. pscp.tv/w/cbEXEzFkclFl…
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Chicago police did not immediately respond to Fox News' request for comment, but the department’s official Twitter account retweeted the livestream of Lightfoot’s news conference Thursday afternoon.
The department later announced that an internal investigation had been opened into the incident.
CPD statement regarding investigation into officer presence at Congressman Bobby Rush’s campaign office:
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Rush said his campaign offices had been burglarized at the beginning of June, during protests over the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis police custody on May 25.
So he checked the security cameras, and that’s when he said he found the video of eight or more officers -- including three supervisors, according to the Chicago Tribune.
Mayor Lightfoot said the images show the individuals taking a break in Rush’s office while small businesses were looted and burned -- and while their fellow officers were outside “getting bottles thrown at their heads” by rioters. (City of Chicago)
“They even had the unmitigated gall to make coffee for themselves and to pop popcorn, my popcorn, in my microwave, while looters were tearing apart businesses within their sight, within their reach,” Rush said during the news conference. “And they did not care about what was happening to businesspeople, to this city. They didn’t care.”
Chicago police officers were “lounging” in U.S. Rep. Bobby Rush’s campaign office, popping corn and drinking coffee, while looters hit nearby stores, the congressman said today.chicago.suntimes.com/2020/6/11/2128…
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Rush, a co-founder of the Illinois Black Panther Party, has butted heads with Lightfoot in the past, accusing her of being too close with police unions, the Tribune reported.
But during the news conference, Lightfoot thanked him for bringing the incident to her attention and said that she had been elected on a platform that included improving government transparency -- especially surrounding the police department.
“She has been a reconciler of the many differences that she didn’t create, but she has the compassion and the resolve, the strength and the courage, to correct,” Rush said.
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