CHICAGO — As Mayor Brandon Johnson has shaken hands in church pews and given booming speeches in school auditoriums while selling his 2026 budget plan directly to Chicagoans, one color has been notably muted among his supporters: purple.

That’s the signature hue of the Service Employees International Union, whose local affiliates were Johnson’s second-biggest labor backer in his 2023 election. Instead, the self-styled “most pro-worker mayor” in Chicago’s history has only seen one union vociferously cheer his $16.6 billion proposal, despite his hard line against layoffs: the red-shirted Chicago Teachers Union.

It’s a sign of the times after a “fissure” between the once-close SEIU and CTU has grown into a full-blown “fracture,” said Ald. Desmon Yancy, a freshman progressive who previously served in SEIU leadership.

And the labor fight has implications for the whole city. Billions of dollars in property taxes and other money from residents’ pockets are in play as Johnson tries to get aldermen to approve his spending plan. With some unions working against him or staying on the sidelines, he has less political firepower and could be forced to compromise his progressive vision in ways big and small in exchange for votes.

“It’s definitely an odd moment that they aren’t active,” Yancy said of the SEIU. “The reason why this mayor was elected was because of work that, frankly, progressive labor did over the last decade, (only) to have the — pardon the pun — fruit of that labor get us to this moment that we’re in right now, where there isn’t a cohesive progressive labor push around this key agenda item for the mayor.”

Yancy was talking about Johnson’s budget bid to revive the corporate head tax, which aldermen voted down last week in a remarkable revolt. Meanwhile, the Chicago Federation of Labor has not yet endorsed the mayor’s budget because it would halve the city’s advance payment to underfunded public worker pensions and balance the books by using a record amount of money from special tax districts that would otherwise fund construction projects around Chicago.

The trade unions are at the forefront of the latter concern, while another city labor group is protesting cuts to the libraries. SEIU, whose local chapters did not provide comment for this article, has neither publicly endorsed nor opposed the plan.

But CTU Vice President Jackson Potter predicted labor will indeed come to a consensus “on the question of, the wealthy and the corporations should pay before we see any reductions in staff.”

“Ultimately, this budget is a litmus test of which side are you on,” Potter said, a nod to the 1930s anthem of coal mine strikers.

Some of the labor world’s tension stems from Johnson’s $1 billion tax increment financing district sweep, needed to close $233 million of the city’s own budget gap and provide a lifeline to Chicago Public Schools. The district would be due to receive $572.6 million to stave off potential midyear cuts and reimburse the city for a $175 million pension payment.

To stress the need, the teachers union launched a website with a calculator it says shows CPS cuts without that TIF surplus, by ward. The topline message for the first council member of 50 reads: “Schools in Alder Daniel La Spata’s Ward (1) will stand to lose $13,565,069 and 191 positions. This will affect 7,137 students of which 81% are non-white. Take action! Tell your Alder to vote YES for TIF surplus!”

It is an implicit message to CPS parents that aldermen who oppose Johnson’s budget are supporting school cuts.

Critics argue the calculator is misleading because aldermen are unlikely to vote down the whole surplus, and any reduction would not necessarily translate into 1:1 cuts as laid out by the website. Potter countered, arguing even though those numbers represent “averages” that the shortfall is distributed equally, CPS schools would suffer across the city.

A coalition of building trades — unions that represent carpenters, plumbers, laborers, engineers, ironworkers, painters and electrical workers — is arguing such a large TIF surplus would kill both long- and short-term construction jobs. Sapping that money from ward projects in order to balance the city’s books would jeopardize building renovations, roadwork and other infrastructure projects that employ those unions in the public and private sector alike, they say.

They have been joined by big business interests and more wonkish aldermen who shared a broader concern that sweeping TIFs is a one-time fix that will do nothing to reduce next year’s budget strain.

“Once you eat it up, it’s gone,” said Marc Poulos of the Operating Engineers Local 150. It and other construction unions backed Johnson’s rival U.S. Rep. Jesus “Chuy” Garcia in the 2023 mayoral race but have since donated to Johnson’s political fund.

Asked to address that pushback, Johnson last week countered residents want to see that tax money going straight to parks and libraries. “I think we’re always going to be on the right side when we’re invested in people,” he said.

Meanwhile, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 1215 has protested Johnson’s plan to slash 89 vacant full- and part-time Chicago Public Library positions and halve the collections fund used to buy books. Those steep cuts would come despite the record proposed TIF surplus, and are on top of 74 similar vacancy cuts in the 2025 budget.

Federation of Labor President Bob Reiter said some degree of dissent is to be expected among such a diverse coalition.

“That’s just a day in the life of being a federation leader,” Reiter said. The lack of endorsement doesn’t mean they won’t reach consensus, he said. “In terms of labor, there’s been no greater partner than the city’s workers and the residents of our city who are members of the labor movement.”

Meanwhile, a mayoral opponent recently aggravated union leaders when he called for more “shared sacrifice” from city workers. “I’m going to say something uncomfortable: Labor needs to be at the table,” Southwest Side Ald. Matt O’Shea said Wednesday during a City Club of Chicago panel.

Absent the layoffs the mayor has taken off the table, whittling down health care costs or enacting furloughs would require unions to voluntarily give up protections enshrined in their contracts, which labor is unlikely to do.

“Corporations need to come to the table first. And right now, we just haven’t seen that,” the mayor told reporters.

Johnson tried unsuccessfully to raise property taxes in his 2025 budget, but is now maintaining he will veto any spending plan that raises that levy next year. And he says obstinate aldermen are the ones refusing to collaborate on a solution because they have yet to present an alternate budget proposal.

Though SEIU has stayed out of the spotlight, the group does benefit from parts of Johnson’s plan. The record TIF sweep means the city’s schools, libraries and parks where a large share of SEIU members work receive a big cut. Those employees are also part of the pension plan that would be covered by $175 million of CPS’ total $572.6 million chunk of the surplus.

And $7 million of the $100 million Johnson’s team projects from his head tax would go toward subsidizing child care pay. A coalition championing those workers that includes SEIU Healthcare Illinois has praised the payment, but demanded the amount be increased to $20 million.

The mayor’s office has also scaled back a proposed geographic expansion of the city’s congestion fee on Uber and Lyft rides, which affects drivers that SEIU Local 1 is attempting to organize statewide. But that could be as much a bone to aldermen worried about costs for residents in those boundaries as to labor worried about declining ridership.

SEIU also endorsed the People’s Unity Platform, a campaign that called for reinstating the head tax ahead of Johnson’s 2026 budget address. But that’s the extent of that left-leaning organization’s direct cheerleading. An earlier spat with CTU over who should represent CPS jobs has made the once-familiar sea of purple and red union shirts during pro-Johnson rallies a rarer sight.

The break between the unions may have its origins in policy disputes, but it has played out in a series of public spats and accusations of “bullying and dishonesty” that threaten the prospects of Chicago’s two bedrock progressive political powerhouses mending fences.

Close labor watchers and some aldermen have privately grumbled that CTU’s pressure campaign makes reaching consensus that much more difficult.

Last week, Yancy leveled his own gripe with the teachers union for publicly blasting him after the Finance Committee shot down the mayor’s head tax. “The day after Black Chicagoans got hit with 100% property tax increases, council members like Desmon Yancy are putting millionaire-yacht owners ahead of the children,” a CTU statement that has since been deleted from its website said.

Yancy isn’t on the Finance Committee, so did not vote on the head tax. “CTU’s brand has been attack, attack, attack. This isn’t new, just, some of us are on a different side of it right now,” Yancy said. He said he’s separately received pressure from a fellow South Side alderman who suggested a no vote would mean pulled support from the union come election time. “That sort of stuff won’t move me at all. In fact, it’ll push me further away from supporting the mayor’s agenda.”

Poulos doesn’t fault CTU’s tactics, describing them as the same ones every other union uses to help reach their ends. “Whether constituents buy it” is an open question, he added.

Potter, for his part, noted Yancy brought the conversation public by criticizing the mayor’s budget in the media, but said “some of this is productive struggle around where people stand, who they stand with and who they stand for.”

“When you have strong allies, you can have legitimate differences and debate and struggle and still end at a similar place,” Potter said.

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