The Democratic National Committee will host its 2024 presidential nominating convention in Chicago, the DNC announced Tuesday.
The Windy City was on of three finalists to host the convention, along with Atlanta and New York City.
President Biden personally called Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Sen. Tammy Duckworth of Illinois to tell them the news.
Word of Chicago’s hosting of the convention comes less than a week after Mayor-elect Brandon Johnson, fresh off his mayoral election victory, pitched the president on hosting the Democratic National Convention.
The DNC, in its announcement, highlighted that their convention is returning the Midwest, which it called “a critical Democratic stronghold” and that Illinois, along with Wisconsin, Michigan, and Minnesota, were part of the “blue wall” that was crucial to President Biden’s 2020 White House victory.
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Biden, who had the final say in the decision, emphasized in a statement that “Chicago is a great choice to host the 2024 Democratic National Convention.
“Democrats will gather to showcase our historic progress including building an economy from the middle out and bottom up, not from the top down,” the president added.
And in a hint toward his expected re-election announcement later this year, Biden said that “from repairing our roads and bridges, to unleashing a manufacturing boom, and creating over 12.5 million new good-paying jobs, we’ve already delivered so much for hard working Americans – now it’s time to finish the job.”
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The convention will take place Aug. 19-22 next year, and is expected to draw between 5,000 and 7,000 delegates and alternates and attract up to 50,000 visitors to Chicago.
Chicago, which for over a year had been one of the front-runners to hold the 2024 convention, last hosted a convention in 1996, when then-President Bill Clinton won re-election.
The city also hosted the infamous 1968 Democratic convention, which witnessed a brutal clash between police and demonstrators protesting the Vietnam War.
Chicago is solidly blue and holding the convention in a pro-union city could demonstrate Biden’s strong support for organized labor, which could be critical to his chances of winning a second term in the White House.
The Republican National Committee announced last year that the GOP’s 2024 presidential nominating convention will be held in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Republicans will hold their convention a month ahead of the Democrats.
While Illinois is a reliably blue state, Wisconsin is a crucial general election battleground.
Pritzker, a longtime Democratic donor, was a key figure in Chicago landing the convention. He repeatedly touted that the nation’s third most populous city had the infrastructure, experience, and financial resources to run a successful large-scale event like a presidential nominating convention. And he reportedly guaranteed the financial success of the convention.
And Pritzker and Duckworth were able to garner regional support for Chicago’s bid.
But Chicago has grabbed plenty of attention in recent years for its crime and high homicide rate.
The National Republican Congressional Committee press secretary Will Reinert, reacting to the convention news, argued “what’s the bigger concern: sirens drowning out nominating speeches or what items attendees must leave at home to make room for their bulletproof vest in their suitcase?”
Atlanta was viewed as Chicago’s closest competitor, and Georgia – a onetime red state that’s turned into a crucial southeastern general election battleground – was one of a handful of swing states that Biden narrowly carried to win the White House. Plus, the Democrats’ sweeping of Georgia’s twin Senate runoff elections on Jan. 5, 2021 gave the party the Senate majority.
But union leaders favored Chicago due to Georgia’s history of hostility to the labor movement, and many Democrats also questioned holding a convention in a state where the governor’s office and legislature are firmly in the hands of the GOP, and in a state where Republicans in recent years passed strict abortion access laws and eased restrictions on gun access.