U.S. Rep. Jesús “Chuy” García defended his decision on Wednesday to quietly drop his bid for a fifth term in Congress, effectively handing the post to his chief of staff. This move has raised questions about the Southwest Side progressive’s legacy as a reformer and opened him up to accusations of hypocrisy, as critics claim he borrowed tactics from the old-school Chicago machine playbook he has long opposed.
In an interview with the Tribune, García explained that he did not make his decision public sooner due to a rapid sequence of family and health issues. By the time the decision became public on Monday evening, the only Democratic petitions filed for the 4th Congressional District seat were his and those of his chief of staff, Patty Garcia—whose paperwork was submitted literally at the last minute when the filing period closed at 5 p.m. Monday.
The congressman plans to withdraw his petition signatures, leaving Patty Garcia as the sole Democratic candidate on the ballot in the heavily blue district.
“The clock was ticking, and I was concerned about having an option,” said García, 69, outlining a series of events including a cardiologist’s advice to prioritize his health and step away from the stress of Congress. This appointment occurred on October 27, the same day his candidate paperwork was filed with the Illinois State Board of Elections in Springfield.
The next day, as García was leaving for Washington, his wife—whose multiple sclerosis has been worsening—urged him not to run again. On Friday, the couple finalized the adoption of their grandson, the 8-year-old child of their daughter who passed away in 2023.
“I didn’t want to be forced into going into another term if I would have won, knowing my new urgencies as it relates to my health, my wife’s health and my family responsibilities,” García told the Tribune.
Although García had not formally withdrawn his nominating petitions as of Wednesday evening, he said he intends to serve out the remainder of his current term, which ends in January 2027. He also stated that he has no plans to run for public office in the future.
García’s decision to keep the news private prevented other potential candidates in the district—which stretches from Pilsen to Oak Brook and Franklin Park to Burbank—from having even a narrow window to collect the 697 valid voter signatures needed to secure a place on the primary ballot. However, on Friday, he did call allies and supporters, who expressed “very enthusiastic support for Patty” to run in his stead.
Despite this, the move has drawn criticism from opponents and some former allies.
“Chuy coronates his Chief of Staff to replace him using same machine tactics that got him the seat from Luis Gutierrez, denies a true open primary like every other open congressional district race but hey, #NoKings right? #Hypocrites,” wrote Ald. Raymond Lopez, 15th Ward, a more conservative Democrat who unsuccessfully challenged García in the 2024 primary.
Paul Vallas, former Chicago Public Schools chief and 2023 mayoral candidate (in which García finished fourth in the first round), labeled García a “phony reformer” on social media. Vallas accused García of orchestrating his decision not to run to make it nearly impossible for his handpicked successor to face a challenge.
Criticism also came from within García’s own circle. Dan Cohen, a Democratic strategist who worked on García’s 2015 mayoral campaign, said, “It takes 15 seconds to say you’ve decided not to [run again], and then allow a democratic process to proceed.”
Maneuvering to quietly install an aide in the seat “in the current political context where Dems are saying that democracy itself is being threatened, makes this move even more outrageously selfish, harmful and dangerously counterproductive,” Cohen added.
García acknowledged that the criticism “is fair,” but noted that some criticism was “predictable” or stemmed from philosophical differences.
“Given that the window was closing, I wanted to ensure that there was an option for someone in the progressive lane to get on the ballot, not knowing who would wind up filing,” he said. “But I appreciate that people have the right to criticize and to say what’s on their mind.”
The other candidates who filed to run in the 4th District are Republican Lupe Castillo and Ed Hershey of the Working Class Party, both of whom unsuccessfully challenged García in 2024.
Late Wednesday, Democratic Socialist Ald. Byron Sigcho-Lopez announced he was exploring an independent run for the congressional seat, calling García’s move an “old machine tactic.”
“At a time like this, where we are criticizing Trump for acting as a wannabe dictator, we cannot allow these anointments,” Sigcho-Lopez said. “It’s important that we put into practice our values as progressives.”
Looking ahead, García said he hopes his legacy will be viewed in the context of his work over the past 40 years, saying, “people look at my record over a 40-year period and all the things that we have fought for.”
Though García did not publicly announce his decision last week, his political team collected nearly 300 pages of petition signatures over the weekend for Patty Garcia, who is not related to the congressman. The top petition page submitted includes endorsements from notable allies such as Cook County Commissioner Alma Anaya, 22nd Ward Ald. Mike Rodriguez, state Sen. Celina Villanueva, and state Reps. Aaron Ortiz and Norma Hernandez.
García’s own path to Congress involved a similar last-minute handoff in 2018, when then-U.S. Rep. Luis Gutierrez announced just days before the filing deadline in late 2017 that he was dropping out and endorsing García. That move also faced criticism but at least allowed other candidates some opportunity to gather signatures.
When asked why he did not follow Gutierrez’s lead and make a public announcement, García said he was “pretty confident, though I had not verified and had not received any information, that there were other candidates running.”
“I expected that in other parts of the district, people could be circulating” petitions for other candidates, he added. “During the two days that signatures were collected, I was surprised that nobody called me, given all the doors that people knocked on in the suburban part of the district, in Chicago.”
Patty García, who has resigned from her government job to run, did not respond to interview requests. The congressman said she is expected to make a public announcement of her candidacy in the coming days.
Despite his progressive roots—starting in politics as an ally of Harold Washington, Chicago’s first Black mayor and a reformer—García has in recent years forged a tentative alliance with former Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, one of the last holdovers of the political machine once led by Mayor Richard J. Daley.
García is not alone in using such tactics to boost the prospects of aides. On Monday, the chief of staff to state Rep. Marty Moylan, a Des Plaines Democrat, filed petitions to run for Moylan’s northwest suburban Illinois House seat after Moylan filed his petitions a week earlier and decided not to seek an eighth term.
— Chicago Tribune’s Jake Sheridan contributed to this report.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/11/05/chuy-garcia-defends-4th-district-decision/
