Mayor Rahm Emanuel survived the first runoff election in Chicago's history on Tuesday, defeating Cook County Commissioner Jesus "Chuy" Garcia handily by receiving more than 55 percent of the vote. See the map above for a ward-by-ward breakdown of election results.
After failing to garner a majority in February's general election, Emanuel dropped his hard-nosed demeanor, put on a comfy sweater and promised disenfranchised voters that he'd be nicer. It worked, but Garcia's lack of a concrete plan to keep the city out of financial ruin played a big role as well.
While Chicago voters did not choose the more liberal mayoral candidate (in both policy and facial hair), they did bounce some of the more conservative incumbent aldermen out of office. Natasha Holmes lost the 7th ward, Lona Lane was crushed in the 18th, Deborah Graham couldn't keep the 29th and Ray Suarez was shocked by Milly Santiago in the 31st.
One of the more interesting races is in the 10th ward, where incumbent petcoke supporter John Pope trailed Susan Garza by seven votes with 35 out of 36 precincts reporting on Wednesday morning. In February, constituents there voted overwhelmingly in favor of a referendum that would keep petcoke, a pollutive oil refinery byproduct, out of the ward.
Not surprisingly, Emanuel's win came down to voter turnout. He won the 27 wards with the most ballots cast. More than 39 percent of registered voters came out to the polls on Tuesday, which isn't great, but it's better than the 33 percent that showed up in February.
In the end, Rahm has four more years to try and mend a massive CPS budget shortfall and an underfunded pension program. Perhaps he'll even bring a casino to Chicago.
Editor's note: The wards highlighted in red represent an Emanuel majority, the blue wards represent a majority for Garcia.