Full accounts of fundraising and sources are not yet available, but here’s what we know so far:
NBC said a few days before the election that Paul Vallas raised $19 million, while Brandon Johnson raised “nearly $11 million.”
Chalkbeat Chicago reviewed the donors. Johnson’s money came mainly from unions (CTU gave him $2.2 million) and 8,000 individual contributions. Vallas’ funding came mainly from financiers and supporters of charters, vouchers, and TFA.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
The NYT slant that bolstered Vallas isn’t new. On 9-16-1996, the paper wrote in praise, “Public and Catholic School Chiefs Join Forces”. The article tells us that teachers in the Catholic system received about one-half the salary of teachers in public schools. Vallas’ quote, he “foresaw a day when public and Catholic schools would share facilities, technology, even teachers.” Vallas regularly met with the superintendent of Catholic schools in Chicago. The article explains that Rudy Giuliani also really liked the idea of collaboration (merger?) of the two systems.
It’s evident that people in high places carry out the plans of Paul Weyrich whose work was funded by Koch. The Weyrich training manual that calls for parallel school systems to destroy public schools is posted at Theocracy Watch.
While the NYT deflects by claiming the Johnson win is a union win, Brandon Johnson’s win is a win for Jefferson’s democracy. Jefferson said, in every country, in every age, the priest aligns with the despot.
The NYT understands the importance of structures of White, patriarchy like the Catholic church for the continuance of the current ruling class of social Darwinists who rule through tactics well-known in Ireland during the great hunger when 1,000,000 Irish starved to death.
Let’s publicize the Paul Vallas Money Names once available.
If these backers are revenue streams for charters, then those charters also get called out. No more Shadow Banks, Shadow Venture Capitalist, Shadow Charter Capitalists. Daylight Comes!
Should we publicize the activities of state Catholic Conferences and city dioceses that are aimed at school privatization/vouchers and who their funders are? Or, are we going to observe in silence like we did while the process of overturning Roe happened? You may recall that Sen. Susan Collins claimed, after the fact, that she was deceived by Barrett’s words.
I recommend reading the bio of the Executive Director of the Colorado Catholic Conference.
One Small Snapshot of How It is Done.
INCS Action Independent Committee to promote Illinois charter schools spent $617,000 to oppose Brandon Johnson’s campaign.
They paid for $258,000 in cable television advertisements on 3/16/23 and $359,000 in digital advertising 3/15/23.
INCS is funded by the Illinois Network of Charter Schools,
INCS Action Independent Committee spent an additional $63,000 to oppose Johnson’s campaign. And the committee spent at least $107,000 to support City Council candidates in runoff elections.
Representatives for INCS said President Andrew Broy was unavailable for comment 4/3/23
Vallas is a longtime supporter of efforts to expand charter schools and he backs programs that use public funds to pay tuition at private schools.
He vowed to lift the cap on enrollment in “high-performing charters.”
Favored allowing charter schools to locate in empty or near-empty public school buildings if “they serve neighborhood children.”
And Vallas also backs programs that use public funds to pay tuition at private schools.
https://news.wttw.com/2023/03/28/political-fund-backed-charter-school-network-ramps-spending-defeat-johnson-boost-city
All those qualifications of his promises are forgotten after the election. True of all politicians. Favoring “high quality” charters means favoring all charters.
In the end, all that money and spin didn’t matter. The voters saw through it. Brandon Johnson wins the race, and a huge win for public education in Chicago.https://abc7chicago.com/chicago-mayoral-election-results-brandon-johnson-mayor-new-of-speech/13088280/#:~:text=Paul%20Vallas%20thanked%20his%20supporters,to%20his%20oppononet%2C%20Brandon%20Johnson.
Johnson, I’m sure, will be doing a deeper dive into who voted for Vallas and why. He won but by no means by a landslide, and he has promised to be a mayor for everybody. He has to be. I would have voted for Johnson if I lived in Chicago, but I know he does not have an easy job now. I hope he can form a working relation across the spectrum.
It’s the working class vs a small number of ruthless, wealthy fascists that thinks the working class should have no rights.
To better understand the professor of Constitutional law at Harvard who has been described as the nation’s most dangerous critic of liberalism, a review of Wikipedia’s entry for “Error has no rights” is a good starting place.
In contrast to the NYT, Monica Eng at Axios, explained Brandon Johnson’s win, citing 25,000 millennial votes. Eng’s opinion was that endorsements from a Chicago indie band, Wilco, hip hop musician and actor, Common, and Bernie Sanders carried the day. Eng, a far better analyst than the NYT, avoided the hackneyed refrain- the unions are the boogeymen that made Vallas lose.