Chicago mayor sees connection between rise in carjackings, remote learning

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot (D) said at a press conference Monday there is a connection between carjackings in the city and remote learning.

“A lot of parents went to work during the day thinking their teenagers were logged on to remote learning, only to find something else,” Lightfoot said, NewsNation Now reported.

“I’ll be frank and say in Chicago, there was a correlation that we believe in remote learning and the rise in carjacking,” she added.

Chicago police said more than 170 carjackings have been reported so far in 2022, while the crime has risen in multiple cities across the country. In 2021, there were around 1,900 carjackings in Chicago.

Lightfoot said students were committing the crime out of “pure boredom” and that more community involvement is needed to combat the issue.

“I am not one that believes when you arrest juveniles that you lock them up and throw away the key; that can’t be the answer,” Lightfoot said, according to NewsNation Now. 

The Chicago Teachers Union was quick to denounce Lightfoot’s assessment of the situation.

“Suggesting that our students are somehow responsible for these crimes is the kind of scapegoating and smear tactics Black and Brown students and adults have contended with in any discourse about crime for generations. It’s even more damning coming from a Black elected official,” the union tweeted.

The mayor and the teachers union have been at odds for months over remote learning, with the teachers union participating in a multiday walkout that closed classrooms last year to protest in-person learning during the COVID-19 pandemic.