Johnson says he wasn't aware Gatewood filed IG complaint against top mayoral aides before firing him

Mayor Brandon Johnson said Tuesday he was unaware before Garien Gatewood was fired that the deputy mayor for community safety had filed a complaint against top mayoral aides who lowered the boom.

Gatewood oversaw the community safety plan that Johnson credits with historic drops in violent crime.

Last week, he was summoned into a meeting with Johnson’s chief of staff Cristina Pacione-Zayas and senior mayoral adviser Jason Lee, and told the Johnson administration was “moving in a different direction.”

Gatewood said Tuesday he filed a formal complaint with the inspector general’s office in October that is currently under investigation.

He refused to discuss the nature of those allegations, but sources said the complaint accuses Lee and Pacione-Zayas of improper interference in City Hall's contracting process. The sources also said that Johnson was made aware of those contract interference concerns.

“There have been multiple instances when you attempt to hold senior leadership accountable, there’s a target put on your back,” Gatewood said.

On Tuesday, Johnson was asked whether he was aware that Gatewood had filed a complaint against his two closest advisers.

“That was not brought to my attention. It was not brought to any of our attention,” the mayor said.

Outgoing Inspector General Deborah Witzburg, who has clashed repeatedly with the Johnson administration over a host of ethics issues, refused to confirm or deny that she was investigating Gatewood’s complaint.

Pacione-Zayas said neither she nor anyone else in the mayor’s office has “any knowledge of a complaint” and they have “not received communication from the IG that this was something that they would be investigating,”

Asked if she had improperly interfered in the contracting process by seeking proprietary information from Gatewood, Pacione-Zayas said, “I have no idea what he’s talking about. Zero… I have zero intel on it. That’s why that comment came out of left field.”

Lee could not be reached for comment.

Johnson said he has a “moral responsibility” to create safe workspaces and if there are “grievances or areas of misconduct, there should be investigations” to determine to veracity of those complaints.

The mayor scoffed at the suggestion that there is a “culture of intimidation” that has made city employees afraid to report wrongdoing.

“Clearly, they’re not [intimidated]. Think about how many times you all have covered this. I don’t know of any other administration where people have felt more comfortable” to report wrongdoing, he said.

“People can talk about how they feel. Especially if they feel like they’ve been treated wrong. That’s not intimidating to me. People should feel comfortable to do that.”

Gatewood has challenged the mayor to explain the reasons behind his firing and the ouster of his top deputy. He told the Sun-Times that Johnson and his top aides “shouldn’t be allowed to say they don’t talk about personnel matters.”

On Tuesday, Johnson struggled to explain the policy differences that prompted him to part company with Gatewood.

He would only say that his singular focus was driving down violence by addressing the root causes of crime, and that there is “more work to do” through youth employment, violence intervention and by investing in long-neglected neighborhoods with entrenched poverty.

“We lifted up the work as a whole. I don’t believe we’ve ever just simply singled out one individual as responsible” for the progress, the mayor said.

“This is about continuing the work… but also doubling down on those efforts. There’s more work to be done. I’ll be the first to admit that we still have a little ways to go.”

Pacione-Zayas was more specific. She said the plan was to “double-down on some efforts” already in place, but “go even more precise and narrow” on those efforts, particularly when it comes to “community violence intervention.”

“We’ve got to ensure that the money that was appropriated through the budget gets out the door as soon as possible,” she said.

“Then, we’ve got to obviously ensure that we’ve got the mechanisms in place to be able to track that it is being effectively used and implemented. Victim services — we will continue to provide those efforts, but also track and monitor the outcomes so that we can continue to build the case why it’s important that we provide a comprehensive and sustainable solution well beyond the incident.”

Lee told the Sun-Times last week that Gatewood cannot claim credit for Chicago's success in reducing violent crime.

"If we thought that this one individual was the key or the main driver, or that there would be any impact negatively, clearly no decision like this would have been made," Lee said. "Thousands of people outside of government working in their communities on all kinds of things" produced those results.