Democrats announced Tuesday that they will hold their party’s 2024 national convention in Chicago, choosing the biggest liberal city in the Midwest as they try to keep the momentum going after a strong midterm election performance in the key battleground region.
Organizers from Chicago, Atlanta, and New York spent months lobbying to be the site of the convention, but the final decision lay with President Joe Biden, who is expected to formally launch his reelection campaign in the coming weeks.
Chicago’s leadership has been regularly criticized by Republicans because of the cities high taxes and spiraling violent crime rate.
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“Chicago is a great choice,” Biden said in a statement. “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 Democratic National Committee said its convention would be held Aug. 19-22 and noted that Illinois, along with Wisconsin, Michigan, and Minnesota, was part of the critical Midwestern “blue wall,” which was key to Democrats’ success in the 2020 and 2022 elections.
That rosy language omits the fact that Michigan and Wisconsin broke for Donald Trump in 2016, helping the Republican win the White House.
Chicago is solidly Democratic, and its size gives it huge control over Illinois.
The move also could counter Republicans, who are holding their 2024 convention in Milwaukee, located in another swing Midwestern state, Wisconsin.
Republican National Committee Chairman Ronna McDaniel blasted Democrats’ “radical agenda” and predicted that voters “will soundly reject whichever out-of-touch liberal the Democrats nominate in Chicago.”
The convention will be held at the United Center, home to the NBA’s Chicago Bulls and the Chicago Blackhawks of the NHL.
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The city is also home to major Democratic donors who can help with raising money to cover costs of a convention. That includes Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, a billionaire businessman and heir to the Hyatt hotel fortune who has contributed millions to Democratic causes and candidates, and was a major proponent for his city getting the convention.
The DNC said that Chicago represents the party’s diversity and “formidable coalition” and that the Midwest will “showcase President Biden’s economic agenda” including spending on public works as part of a sweeping bipartisan infrastructure package that cleared Congress in 2021.
The 2020 Democratic convention was supposed to be held in Milwaukee but instead was held virtually because of the coronavirus. Biden delivered a speech accepting his party’s nomination that year at a nearly empty convention center in Wilmington, Delaware near the basement he did most of his campaigning from.
Chicago hosted the infamous 1968 Democratic convention, which is best remembered for a brutal clash between police and far-left protesters opposing the Vietnam War.
The last Democratic National Convention in the city was in 1996, when President Bill Clinton was headed to a second term.
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Take a look —
FLASHBACK: Here’s what the Democratic National Convention looked like the last time it was hosted in Chicago. pic.twitter.com/ktgUEMGYyF
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) April 11, 2023
That Chicago beat out Atlanta was a surprise given Georgia’s strategic importance as a swing state. Biden won Georgia two years ago, becoming the first Democrat to do so in a presidential election since Clinton in 1992, and his party now controls both of its Senate seats after wins that drew national attention the last two cycles.
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Though Atlanta is as thoroughly Democratic as Chicago and New York, Georgia could very well be a major deciding factor in the 2024 presidential race in a way Illinois will not be.
Shunning Atlanta for the convention could ultimately serve as a double blow to Georgia, which may also eventually lose its early place in a new Democratic primary calendar.
Supporters of Atlanta’s bid had argued that the city and the rest of Georgia could, in a dream scenario, lead a resurgence of Democrats in the South, which remains largely steadfastly Republican.
Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens said Tuesday that Biden personally called him to say that Chicago had been chosen.
“They said Atlanta was top two in all the nation, we were hoping we’d be top one,” Dickens told reporters. “But they said next time, maybe.”
The Associated Press contributed to this article