Mayor Candidate Vallas Refutes Report Questioning Chicago Residency

CHICAGO — The campaign for leading Chicago mayoral candidate Paul Vallas is characterizing a media report questioning his residency status and eligibility to run for mayor as “malicious and untrue” and insists that the former Chicago Public Schools CEO “clearly” meets the requirements for seeking the office.

In a statement issued on Friday, Vallas’ campaign counsel Steven Laduzinsky refuted a report by WTTW that claims that Vallas’ primary residence is in Palos Heights, not Chicago. The report cited paperwork filed with the Cook County’s Assessor’s Office, which the station used to question whether the former CPS executive is eligible to run for mayor in Chicago in his effort to unseat Lori Lightfoot.

The station had copies of records from the assessor's office showing that Vallas has received a tax exemption for a Palos Heights residence that is part of a trust, the report said. WTTW’s report also said that a campaign contribution made by Vallas to then-Illinois Secretary of State candidate Alexi Giannoulias included addresses for both the Palos Heights residence and the Bridgeport apartment where Vallas says he has lived for more than a year.

The report said Vallas has claimed the Palos Heights home as his primary residence since 2009 and also lists the home as the address for a consulting business. Vallas’ campaign has held to the position that the candidate has maintained his Chicago home beyond the one-year residency requirement for mayoral candidates.

According to polls, Vallas is currently one of the frontrunners in the mayoral race, along with U.S. Rep. Jesus “Chuy” Garcia, with incumbent and Lightfoot trailing both in an election that appears headed for a run-off between the top two candidates. A recent Sun-Times/WBEZ poll reported that Garcia has the support of 20 percent of Chicago voters, with Vallas grabbing 18 percent of the vote and Lightfoot having 17 percent with three weeks remaining until the election. The poll indicated that 18 percent of voters are currently undecided.

In a statement on Friday, the Vallas campaign said that Vallas began living in a Bridgeport apartment in January 2022 “meaning that he clearly, unequivocally” meets the one-year residency requirements to seek the office of mayor in Chicago.

Veteran election attorney Burt Odelson told Patch on Friday that Vallas' primary residence remains the rented apartment in Bridgeview and the fact the candidate owns another home in Palos Heights does not affect his ability to seek the mayor's office in Chicago. Oldelson, who said he helped to craft the Vallas response to the WTTW report, said that the only thing that matters is where a candidate where one considers their "home to be."

"It's not where you go to bed at night, it's where you call home," Odelson said, adding that Vallas does go back to the Palos Heights home, but that Chicago is home.

Odelson claims that WTTW "saw some shock value and they went for it". Odelson said that the person from the county assessor's office who provided paperwork to the public television station is being driven by political motives.

"It smacks of politics," Odelson told Patch. "It's just professional. Plain and simple."

He added: "The assessor's office, whoever it is went above and beyond professionalism and into the bowels of politics. ....whoever did this doesn't want Paul Vallas to be the mayor and has a different reason. That's the only reason for this."

The campaign said that Vallas and his wife own the Palos Heights home where Vallas’ wife lives to care for their elderly parents. The statement said that Vallas has lived outside the city due to various positions in other cities over the years. But it said that he has “always maintained his close connection to the city.”

The WTTW report also mentioned another residence in Monee, which the campaign said on Friday that Vallas has no connection to.

“As the frontrunner in this race, we expect criticism from our opponents and scrutiny from the press. However, this false attack on Paul’s residency is absolutely baseless and he clearly, unequivocally meets the legal requirements to run for Mayor,” Laduzinsky, Vallas’ campaign counsel said in the statement on Friday. “It is truly disappointing to see that WTTW pushed forward with this false narrative, apparently buoyed by the Cook County Assessor, who failed to contact our campaign or even conduct any type of due diligence before releasing false information. Based on the facts, we have demanded that the Assessor’s Office publicly retract its statement and close its investigation immediately.”

The statement continues: “This kind of unprofessional reporting misleads voters and spreads disinformation. Our campaign is focused on communicating Paul’s message of putting crime reduction and public safety first, and we will not be distracted by baseless allegations and rumor-mongering.”