Art Wiggins Wants To Fight Politicking As Chicago Heights Mayor

CHICAGO HEIGHTS, IL — Arthur Wiggins, Jr. wants you to know he is running for mayor.

That’s been a tough message to get out. His opponent, David Gonzalez, has been mayor since 2011 and needs no introduction. Wiggins is running a self-funded campaign and small-dollar campaign, and has few, if any, campaign literature pieces or yard signs. He was also temporarily knocked off the ballot in a common political tactic that attempts to delay or erase challengers’ campaigns altogether.

But he’s there, on the ballot, right after Gonzalez. And he’s not giving up.

“That was some dirty campaigning,” he said. “But I am doing my best not to be part of it.”

Wiggins has been through the political wringer before. In 2011, he ran for 1st Ward Alderman, and was removed from the ballot. In 2018, he ran for Bloom Township committeeman and lost.

In between, he’s dogged Chicago Heights politicians as much as he said they dogged him.
For example, he said, city officials have cited or warned him about property violations that were improper or didn’t necessarily exist — a tactic that can be used to intimidate or annoy a potential candidate. For his part, he has alleged voter fraud within city limits and tracked City Clerk Lori Wilcox’s bid for another clerk position in Michigan.

There’s also one thing to get out of the way, something that comes up with every election: His multiple domestic violence arrests and charges from more than a decade ago involving his first wife. Wiggins wants to clear the air: He is innocent.

“Domestic violence legislation is wrong,” he said. “People who beat other people are wrong.”

He said his wife hit him and that he does not beat women. Domestic violence laws are written so that innocent men are easily charged and convicted, he added. Wiggins has since remarried and is happily married, he said.

Still, the issue remains a sore spot.

“A police report in most domestic violence cases are the word of who the police say is the victim,” he wrote in a heated exchange with a potential constituent who asked him about the charges on his campaign’s Facebook page. “Not one woman ever called the police on me except my exwife [sic].”

He’s weary of the politics, he added, but Wiggins said he is ready to fight.

“I am fighting for Chicago Heights,” he said.

Wiggins, 52, is a small-business owner who deals with structured network wiring and security services. He’s a fiscal conservative who believes in small government. And he believes that the economic potential of Chicago Heights has been stymied by old-school, machine-style politics.

“I’m just a regular guy,” he said. And the right one to reform the Heights, he added.

Wiggins said he is looking to rebuild the economic infrastructure to create financial stability for residents. One of the first things he’d do, he said, is abolish the red light cameras installed across the city. That’s too much big government, he said.

He laid out his platform on his Facebook page:

Wiggins has promised to end “politics as usual.” No one should be improperly cited and no one should have their names “dragged through the mud,” he said.

“We need safe streets. We need good schools. More than that, we need a better Chicago Heights,” he said.

“And I will fight for that.”