Lori Lightfoot elected Chicago's first black female mayor

Lori Lightfoot.
(Image credit: Kamil Krzaczynski/AFP/Getty Images)

Lori Lightfoot, a former federal prosector, won Chicago's mayoral election on Tuesday, becoming the city's first black female mayor.

She defeated Toni Preckwinkle, Cook County Board president and chair of the Cook County Democratic Party. Lightfoot, 56, is the second woman to be elected mayor of Chicago, after Jane Byrne, who served one term from 1979 to 1983. This was Lightfoot's first run for office, and with her win, Chicago is now the largest city in the U.S. to ever elect an openly gay mayor.

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.