Rawlings-Blake Bails on Baltimore: Mayor Won’t Seek Reelection Amid Turmoil

Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake announced Friday that she will not seek re-election amid skyrocketing crime rates, riot threats and racial tension. At a press conference on Friday, Rawlings-Blake claimed that she wanted to focus on the community, which under her watch has seen a 56% increase in the murder rate.

The announcement comes as the criminal case for six police officers charged in connection with the death of Freddie Gray commences, and a highly unprecedented announcement by Rawlings-Blake that the city of Baltimore would pay the family $6.4 million in a civil lawsuit that was never filed. Civil lawsuits, particularly ones that were not even filed, are never settled before the criminal trial is completed, as not to poison the jury pool.

In Baltimore, as with many other cities across the nation, a lack of backing from the political leadership has caused police to abandon active patrolling. Arrests since the chaos in April have plunged 60% below 2014 rates. There were 58 murders in Baltimore in the months leading up to April 15 this year, which is up from 49. From April 16 to August 23, there were 157 murders in the city, up nearly double from 88 in 2014. There were 45 murders in July alone, and almost all of the victims were black.