Good morning. Thank you for joining us for this historic moment in our city. Thank you to the
community members, the advocates, the city leaders. Why is it so easy for young people to get access
to guns? That was the question that was asked by a young Chicagoan just last month
at a city council hearing.
Before we talk policy, we have to sit with that question
and remember the human course behind answering it.
The thousands of Chicagoans impacted and injured by gun violence every day
are far more than just data points on a chart.
There are neighbors, loved ones, and human lives
with stories that deserve to be protected.
My name is Emmanuel Andre. I am the Deputy Mayor of Community Safety, and as leaders, we bear the responsibility to help people access safety, restore agency to our neighborhoods, and center accountability throughout our entire process.
Today, through this executive order, the City of Chicago delivers on those promises.
I want to thank Mayor Johnson for his steadfast leadership and commitment to making Chicago the safest, most affordable big city in America.
His focus on innovation shows today as we take decisive action.
Together with Brady United, we are raising our municipal procurement standards.
This executive order cuts off a supply line of harm by making Chicago the safest city requires of us all.
So I leave with this question. How will we how will you answer the young person's question?
And what steps will we take today to build a safer Chicago?
Thank you. And I'm proud to turn the microphone over to President of Brady United, Chris Brown.
Thank you so much. It's such a pleasure to be here. Good morning, everyone. I'm Chris Brown.
Good morning.
I love that. I'm the president of Brady United Against Gun Violence, and it's an incredible privilege and pleasure to stand with the mayor and these incredible leaders today to announce this very exciting initiative.
Brady has been around for a little while. For more than 50 years, we've worked to end
America's gun violence epidemic by advancing policy solutions that actually save lives.
That's why I'm so proud to stand today with Mayor Johnson as Chicago adopts responsible
firearm procurement standards. Today's executive order reflects a very simple principle. Public
dollars
should advance public safety, not undermine it.
And today, far too often, public dollars are, in fact, undermining public safeties.
Many Americans don't know this, but the number one purchaser of guns in this country are taxpayers.
You, me, everyone standing here.
And through government purchases of law enforcement firearms,
Cities and states across the country spend more than $5 billion a year on firearm purchases.
Far too many of those purchases are directed to dealers that routinely sell guns recovered in crime.
And it's not an accident that they do this.
They are knowingly supplying to traffickers, to straw purchasers, and they are fueling gun violence and fueling the end of life in this country.
Brady's research found that millions of taxpayer dollars have flowed to businesses with documented histories.
This is not a secret. It's public records information of violating federal firearm regulations and fueling crime and violence.
That doesn't have to be the status quo. And today, Mayor Johnson is making sure it's not.
As the largest institutional purchaser of firearms in the United States, our governments have tremendous power to shape behavior in the market.
And I want to be clear to reward the 90 percent of gun dealers in this country that sell zero crime guns, zero every single year.
But 5% of them are selling 90%, 90% of the guns recovered in crime.
So the top line here is, let's reward the dealers that are investing in doing everything right.
They deserve our business.
And let's put out of business the dealers that are doing everything wrong.
And I want to say Chicago is joining now a growing movement of state and local governments that Brady has been so incredibly proud to partner with, including Colorado, New Jersey, Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego.
and we hope others, inspired by your leadership
in leveraging their purchasing power
to raise public safety standards
all across the firearms industry
and help reduce the scourge of gun violence, and it will.
Every government purchasing decisions reflects our values.
Today, Chicago is showing that every taxpayer dollar
can reinforce accountability, responsibility, and public safety.
So I want to thank you, Mayor Johnson, for your leadership,
and thank you to everyone committed to building a safer Chicago.
And I'd like to introduce a woman who really needs no introduction.
She's the leader of Brady's Illinois gun violence prevention work.
She has testified before more bodies, public bodies, than anyone I know,
has been an indefatigable advocate because she's also a survivor.
Delphine has lost not one, but two children to the scourge of gun violence.
She's my personal hero, and I want to turn it over to you, Delphine.
Thank you.
Good morning.
My name is Delphine Cherry. She just told you guys that.
I am a Chicago mother, community activist.
I've buried two of my children.
Their names are Thaisa and Tyler.
Thaisa was only 16 years old when she was gunned down with a straight bullet coming out the theater.
Twenty years later, Tyler was coming home from work.
He gets gunned down in front of my home.
And his case is still unsolved.
Because of gun violence, no parent should ever have to know the pain that I go through.
Too often, people look at our neighborhoods like mine and blame our communities for gun violence.
They blame the black and brown families instead of asking profits from a steady flow of guns into our neighborhoods.
The truth is that families like mine are doing everything we can to keep our children safe.
We are not the cause of the crisis.
We are the ones living in the consequences of it each and every day.
The gun industry has made billions while communities like ours
have paid the price of our lost and broken lives and families.
Lasting trauma.
It's time for that industry to be held in a higher standard.
That's why today, actions matter.
Public dollars should reflect values and support businesses that are actually responsible.
Reasonable.
Not companies who practice contribute to the violence that tear families apart.
I have been a local activist for Brady for decades, over a decade, the oldest gun violence prevention organization in the country.
I'm grateful for Brady for leading the national fight for responsible firearm procurement policies and for Mayor Johnson for recognizing that accountability does not stop on our streets.
is extended to the companies that supply us the guns
and the profits from the epidemic.
For the children we lost
and for the children still growing up in Chicago today,
we have to keep our demands better.
Thank you for taking the time to listen to my story.
And now I want to introduce the mayor of Chicago.
Thank you so much.
Y'all didn't let me say it.
Then we have Chicago. That's right. Yeah. Thank you, Delphine.
I thought she was going to say the indefatible. I got it right. Yeah.
I don't even know what that word is. I just I want to be like Delphine, though, brave and courageous.
The unimaginable pain that you have had to live with. Sister, we admire your strength and your advocacy.
Thank you to Chris Brown for your leadership and your words today, our deputy mayor, and the soul of Chicago is present in the office again.
I mean, this is a reflection of the beauty of our city.
We have our alders here, members of the district council, all committed to ensuring that we create a city that is free from violence.
And so, first of all, good morning, everyone.
Good morning.
And I do really thank you all for being here. I do want to thank Brady United Against Gun Violence for their partnership and advocacy,
as well as everyone who has joined us today in support of this very important effort.
I want to give a special shout out to our community violence intervention partners.
I feel like Live Free Chicago has been in my office more than I've been.
But thank you. And their work is is building trust and interrupting cycles of violence.
And it's helped make Chicago a safer place.
But they also remind us every day that lasting public safety is built through community.
And today I'm proud to sign an executive order strengthening the city of Chicago's procurement standards for firearms and firearm accessories and ammunition.
This executive order reflects a simple belief that every taxpayer dollar should be advanced for public safety and it should support responsible business practices.
What that means is that companies that seek to do business with the city of Chicago, they must share our commitment to accountability and what true community safety entails.
This order puts irresponsible actors on notice, and if a vendor fails to take seriously its responsibility to prevent the unlawful diversion of firearms, it should not expect to profit from Chicago taxpayer dollars.
The city has tremendous purchasing power, and with that, that purchasing power comes responsibility, and that responsibility is about where our values rest.
It's about standing with the families who have lost loved ones to gun violence.
It's about honoring survivors, and it's about doing everything within our power to prevent the next tragedy from ever taking place.
Every parent deserves a peace of mind that their child will make it home safely.
Every neighborhood deserves to be a place where children can play and where families can thrive and people can walk their streets without fear.
that is why my administration
has been committed to using every tool available to drive down gun violence.
We have invested in young people, expanded community violence intervention,
strengthened victim services, increased access to mental and behavioral health care,
and worked alongside our law enforcement partners to make our communities safer.
Earlier this month, we established the Office of Gun Violence Reduction
to better coordinate this work across city government
because we know that lasting public safety requires collaboration and urgency.
And today's executive order builds on that work. Now, as much as I know that we have more work to do, we also have to make sure that government is behaving responsibly, particularly in our procurement process.
And so this executive order directs the Department of Procurement Services in consultation with the Chicago Police Department, the Office of Public Safety Administration and the Department of Law to strengthen the standards the city uses when purchasing firearms, firearm accessories and ammunition.
Vendors seeking to do business with the city will be expected to demonstrate compliance with firearm laws and regulations and provide greater transparency around the practices that they have in place.
We also recognize that the city has existing contracts that were established before I took office.
This executive order ensures that as contractors come up for renewal and new contracts are considered, these stronger standards will guide how the city partners with firearm vendors moving forward.
Upholding strong procurement expectations prevents unlawful firearm trafficking, straw purchasing theft and illegal diversion of firearms.
Last year, the Chicago Police Department removed over 11000 weapons off the streets of our city, all of which have come from states that do not hold to these same standards.
These standards reflect the values that guide my administration and the responsibility that we have to the people that we serve.
We know there is no single policy that will end gun violence.
But we also know that meaningful progress comes when we use every tool available to protect our people.
With this executive order, Chicago joins growing numbers of cities, counties, and states that are using their purchasing power to encourage greater accountability across the firearm industry and to advance responsible business practices.
Finally, those efforts are making a difference.
Chicago experienced historic reduction in violence, including homicides, reaching the lowest level in nearly 60 years during 2025.
We owe it to every family that has experienced unimaginable loss to keep building on that progress.
And again, I want to thank Brady and everyone who has helped make today's executive order possible.
Together, we will continue using every tool available to build a better, stronger and a much safer Chicago where every family has the opportunity to not just survive, but to thrive.
Thank you all very much.
I'm going to sign the executive order first, right?
Yes.
Thank you, Keith.
All right. There we have it. Congratulations. Thank you, sir.
I'm going to let you hold that for now. Okay. All right. All right. You're welcome.
Thanks so much. Two quick questions that are connected, if you have a quick moment.
Typically, when you limit who you buy from, prices can go up. What guarantees will you give that taxpayers will not be on the hook for this?
And additionally, critics argue it's criminals with guns and ammo creating all the problems, not how the city buys their guns and ammo.
Well, in terms of taxpayers, what we are working to ensure is that their dollars are not going towards the degradation or the harm of our own communities.
Right. That's the first responsibility that we have.
The impetus behind having stronger procurement processes is to make sure that the 90 percent of the responsible entities are.
rewarded. And when you have 5% of these entities that are contributing to 90% of the problem,
we at least know where we can zero in and focus in on. That gives taxpayers insurance that we're
not just out here in make-believe land, that we're quite targeted. And as far as those who
are responsible for violence, Dr. Keene quoted a philosopher when he was being interviewed by
michael douglas and he talked about when when darkness is present crime manifests but he also
said though that those who live in that darkness did not create it and so i think it's important
that in this season that we are especially reflective that we are not perpetuating this
notion that somehow the trauma that people are living under that they did not create and that
we hold them responsible for those conditions versus the entities and the corporations that
are actually causing that type of harm and trauma.
I just wanted to ask.
Yes, it is.
Okay.
So weapons and ammo right now can only be purchased through approved vendors, correct?
I'm just having a hard time understanding this.
If that's the case, then why?
I guess my question is, why would this executive order be needed then if weapons and ammo is
only being able to be purchased through approved vendors at this point.
Well, so you're correct that they have to be approved through a process.
What we are doing now is strengthening that process so that we can clearly identify the entities
that have not been living up to what taxpayers would expect,
that their firearms do not get into the hands of individuals that could cause harm in our communities.
Again, we're talking about 5% of the overall entities that we purchase from.
This is not something that we can't course correct.
So imagine this.
If we can course correct 5% of our overall entity, we could course correct what is manifesting on our streets.
So this is actually giving us the tools that we need to strengthen that process.
Could you just go into some of the specific restrictions that are laid out in the executive order?
I mean, what are the new guidelines that the vendors would have to abide by?
I want to respond to that.
Brady, I want to respond to that.
This executive order sets up a 90-day process to determine exactly what those particular restrictions will look like.
if it follows the other cities and states where we've passed these kind of procurement regulations,
what will happen is there will be a process to determine if there are particular sales being considered
or purchases being considered, the names of those dealers will be vetted against publicly available information
to determine whether those same dealers had crime guns traced to them.
And that's a matter of the public record.
Brady has access to those. ATF has access to those. CPD has access to those. The state of Illinois has access to those.
It's just right now there's not a process to review all of those, along with also indictments that are brought by prosecutors across this country against those exact same dealers.
So there will be a process to do all of that, vet all of that.
And if those dealers are included in those lists, then that information will be reviewed and understood in terms of where purchasing dollars should go versus where they shouldn't go.
To your knowledge, does the city currently purchase firearms or munitions from stores that you said, you know, like 5% of stores result in 90% of crime guns?
Are there purchases from those particular vendors right now?
There's one that we are keeping our eye on.
This is a contract that was settled prior to me arriving.
What is that, the O'Haran?
Ray O'Haran.
So we're keeping an eye on that.
That's why in my remarks it also included renewal.
And I think to Chris's point, that as we go through this process, if it turns out throughout this process,
like the one that has been named by Brady, that there are issues with this particular company,
then that will play a part in whether or not they could be renewed.
Delphine, thank you for sharing your story and being here.
My question is probably for Chris and the mayor.
Can you just explain the process of how these dealers are getting these crime guns
and then how those crime guns are being purchased by city governments,
which I'm assuming are mostly going to city police departments?
How is that process happening, and why is that so bad?
for the citizens?
Well, I think the mayor really...
spoke to it, right? And so I could take 20 minutes to answer this question, but I'll try to answer
it in two. We have more gun dealers in America than McDonald's, Starbucks, and Walmart combined,
okay? 5% of them, and we know this from ATF research, are responsible for 90% of the crime
guns, right? So what does that imply? What that's implying is that dealers are knowingly selling,
and Brady has litigated these cases for 30 years, including on behalf of police officers
who were shot in the line of duty by these crime guns in Chicago
that are sold knowingly, willful blindness, to straw purchasers and or traffickers.
And when I told you that 90% of the dealers have zero crime guns,
it means that when a police officer goes to recover a gun used in crime,
what they do is they ping an ATF database that tells them the last known dealer.
And that dealer then is associated with a gun recovered in crime.
When I say that 90% of dealers have zero crime guns, it means that there's not any information in any of those databases that they have ever sold a gun, regardless of volume of sales recovered in crime.
Let's contrast that with the 5% that are not selling one or two crime guns.
They're selling dozens, in some cases, hundreds of crime guns.
Those are guns that are being knowingly trafficked into communities across this country and that are subject to straw purchasers.
So the basic bottom line here is just like any other industry, OK, where you have controls over your supply chain, that kind of oversight is not being provided.
There's a lot of political reasons why that's happening.
There are 32 rules pending right now by the Trump administration that would reverse a huge amount of the progress that has resulted in record low crime, record low gun violence in cities like Chicago.
This procurement effort is a piece of a much larger network effect that needs to happen so that manufacturers actually stop selling to dealers that have crime guns.
And this component is a key piece of that. Taxpayer dollars can actually really shut down dealers that routinely violate the law.
So it's really the power of the purse rather than additional regulation, per se.
That's good. Three minutes and 17 seconds. I got you. I was keeping up.
Well-winded.
No, you're fine.
The reason we're here today is because you are now maybe investigating if the city has possibly purchased.
Is that why we're taking action today?
Well, this is about being proactive as well.
You know, look, you know, Delphine's story, what's tragic about her story is that she's not the only one who has that.
And with all of the work that we're doing, youth employment, behavior and mental health, Office of Gun Violence Reduction,
I mean, I'm using every single tool that's available to me and I am not going to stop short of of ensuring that families can live in the city of Chicago, afford to live here and feel safe.
Again, when you have such a hyper concentration of crime guns being recovered from a small percentage over the overall industry, it gives us that much more hope, quite frankly, and direction of where we can apply pressure.
And using the taxpayer dollars as an incentive to encourage responsible partnerships with government,
I believe that is the most reasonable expectation that the people of Chicago should have of a mayor.
Hey, can you describe what the city's relationship with this store that you mentioned, Ray O'Haron,
and the potential problems that that store has had are?
Can you give more there?
Well, here's what I know.
It was a contract that was confirmed prior to me being in office.
And as I've said, now that they have been named or implicated in a way,
it's challenging my administration to not only take a deeper look at all of the relationships that we have,
but one in particular that has been cited by Brady.
And also on gun violence, how does your administration evaluate how successful CVI vendors are?
Yeah, where CVI exists, we have seen reductions as high as 45 to 50 percent in gun violence.
Their effectiveness, quite frankly, is better confirmed than the closing of schools.
I can tell you
Yeah, ineffective that was. Right. Because where schools were closed, violence proliferated, where public housing was shut down.
And when people cannot afford rent and when they are forced out without just cause, it creates more instability and violence goes up in those particular communities.
There is greater track record of what has failed in this city.
Now, the good news, though, is that where CBI has been present, and I commend these brothers and sisters who have returned out of a system that was never designed to rehabilitate them, but yet somehow they found enough hope to bring inspiration into the communities that they were traumatized by.
Think about how powerful that is. A community that traumatized you sends you to a system that further traumatized you.
But yet somehow, by God's grace, you come through that and you're able to help drive down violence in communities that, you know, have been suffering from degradation and deprivation and disinvestment for decades.
I think we should figure out how to give CVI a raise and tax the rich to do it.
Because my colleagues have asked all the questions I could think of.
Don't use that as an excuse to ask an off-topic question, Greg.
Don't even try it.
Well, let me set you up with this.
Good luck dropping your son off today.
That's a good way to warm up to me.
Go ahead now.
Go ahead and ask your little off-the-top question.
Yes.
You told that.
So why should Chicago and the investment community not be concerned about the departure at this time of your acting CFO heading into the budget season
and with the Investors Conference coming here next month?
Yeah, because we'll find another one.
Yeah, we'll find another one, and I'm grateful to Stephen for his leadership and his work,
but the work doesn't stop because one individual moves on, right?
If that was the case, government would never be a continuum.
People move on all the time, but here's the thing that's most steady.
I'm still here.
The other question I want to ask you, kind of following up from yesterday,
do you think social media influencers who are paid by political campaigns ought to be required to disclose that,
similar to what campaign ads on TV are required to disclose who's behind them?
Well, you know, I think as our sort of communications environment emerges and changes,
you know, I don't see why at some point, you know, that type of, you know, disclosing wouldn't be necessary.
I think that there's some value in people knowing who's responsible for what.
Right. I mean, if you look at take some really good examples here in Chicago where it's, you know, the what's the it's not just APEC.
What's that that newer one that's behind school closures now in the school board race?
It's a bunch of bad. The one that Michael Sachs is funding. Right. Right.
Right. And so I think that what you have seen, unfortunately, in politics where, you know, dark money and influence has has shaped the sort of the political paradigm, I think that there's some value in that.
But I will say this, though, for the social media influencers, I'm grateful for them.
I mean, you raised this question yesterday. You know, somehow if someone says something nice to me, I got to pay for it.
You know, of course, I reject the notion, but the idea of having greater disclosure around, you know, who's supporting which candidate or campaigns, I think we should take it one step further.
I think we should actually have full campaign finance reform and get big corporations out of elections altogether so that the people and the will of the people can ultimately determine who gets to represent them.
All right, congratulations, you all.
Thank you.
I appreciate your hard work.
Thank you.