* Chicago Tribune…

Mayor Brandon Johnson’s letter to Illinois Senate President Don Harmon last month vowing not to shut down selective enrollment schools was directly edited by a Chicago Teachers Union lobbyist — and was preceded by an earlier version that made no such promise, the Tribune has learned.

During the waning days of the latest Springfield session, the mayor made a last-minute plea to Harmon in a letter asking him to not call for a vote the bill to extend a moratorium on all Chicago Public Schools closings. That capped off a weekslong power struggle between the CTU, which also opposed the legislation, and state legislators who wanted to ink the two-year extension to ensure selective enrollment schools would not be shuttered.

Harmon pointed to Johnson’s promise in the late May letter as evidence of the trust between the two officials, saying the mayor’s “commitment to me is even more clear and more binding than the bill would have been.”

But public records provided to the Tribune reveal a CTU official helped craft the eleventh-hour letter that likely saved the teachers union and Johnson from an embarrassing defeat in the statehouse, as well as an earlier, watered-down version.

I had heard that the first letter Johnson sent to Harmon was long on rhetoric and short on promises. The second letter was far more specific. So, while highly unusual, the CTU input may have actually helped the mayor’s cause with Harmon.

Go read the rest. Interesting piece.