As he runs for a second term this year, Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb argues that he has attended to the basics. He is quick to point out that homicides are down and police pay is up. Residents have a new 311 system for complaints about potholes, trash bins and vacant homes.
A Democrat loyal to President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, Bibb says he intends to work with incoming President Donald Trump and Republicans when it benefits Cleveland. Asked whether he’d consider himself part of “the resistance” to Trump, the mayor said this:
“I think Clevelanders and the American people are tired of ‘the resistance,’” Bibb said. “They’re tired of the bickering between Democrats and Republicans. They are tired of this left-vs.-right debate.”
Bibb spoke with Signal Cleveland last week about his reelection message, the future of police reform and the new Republican era in Washington, D.C. Instead of partisan fighting, voters want leaders who will take care of such basic needs as safety, he said.
“They want to make sure that their kids have a safe place to go to school,” Bibb said. “They want to make sure that they are going to work that’s paying them a livable wage where they can buy a home or maybe start a business one day. And they want a country that’s going to be safe.”
The political terrain has shifted in the four years since Bibb first made a go at the mayor’s job.
Bibb ran in 2021 as a young City Hall outsider who pledged to modernize hidebound city services. With police reform movements in national headlines, he stood out as one of the few candidates to endorse a sweeping police oversight amendment known as Issue 24.
Now, as an incumbent mayor, Bibb says he has delivered on such promises as turning over the West Side Market to a nonprofit operator. But his administration still faces criticism from City Council over police staffing and neighborhood quality of life. And while Bibb isn’t proposing to do away with Issue 24, he is openly talking about reworking it.
Democratic mayors around the country are facing political headwinds from their voters. The mayors of San Francisco and Oakland were ousted last year, and the mayor of Chicago faces dismal numbers in a poll by City Council members.
Bibb faces headwinds of his own, from the Browns’ proposed move out of the city to attrition on the police force. But the mayor contends he is doing what he told voters he would do four years ago.
“On many fronts, from public safety to modernizing City Hall to making sure we put people and neighborhoods first, we’ve made strong progress over the last three years,” Bibb said.
So far, only one candidate has publicly announced a challenge to the mayor: Laverne Jones Gore, who as a Republican faces an uphill climb in this strongly Democratic city.
Read on for highlights from the interview with Bibb.
Listen to the full interview:
‘Not happy’ with Issue 24 progress
Issue 24 granted new disciplinary powers to the Civilian Police Review Board and the Community Police Commission, two of the seven entities that oversee Cleveland police inside and outside of City Hall.
But progress has been slow going. Police commission members have feuded and the board’s executive director is suing the city. Meanwhile, City Hall introduced draft police oversight manuals just last year.
The mayor said he did not believe that it was a mistake to pass Issue 24 to begin with. That’s the argument advanced by a backer of a nascent effort to repeal the amendment. But Bibb said that he is “not happy” with the progress so far.
His administration is considering what a change to the Issue 24 charter amendment might look like, he said. The mayor raised the possibility of streamlining such oversight bodies as the police commission, the review board and the Office of Professional Standards, which investigates resident complaints against officers and dispatchers.
“We have to find a way, I think, long term, to consolidate those oversight agencies to make it make sense, not only for our residents, but also for the men and women of our police department,” he said.
Bibb has nominated a new slate of candidates to the Community Police Commission. He called them a “more pragmatic group” that would bring a “common-sense approach to police accountability.”
The mayor is also watching how the Trump administration handles Cleveland’s consent decree, the police reform agreement that the city signed 10 years ago with then-President Barack Obama’s Justice Department. Bibb said he would like the Trump administration to give Cleveland a clear timetable for fulfilling the decree.
“In the event that President Trump decides to get rid of these consent decrees, then it’s going to be my responsibility as mayor to make sure that the progress that we’ve made under the consent decree is sustained over time,” Bibb said.
‘Aggressive’ policing in hotspots for violent crime
The number of homicides in Cleveland has fallen from a spike in 2020, despite a dwindling police force. Cities around the country have seen a drop in murders, but Bibb argued that Cleveland police deserve credit for the decline.
According to Bibb, City Hall has been “concentrating aggressive law enforcement activity where we know we see the intelligence showing us that there’s a high propensity of violent crime occurring.”
There were 110 homicides in Cleveland in 2024, according to figures from the city’s open data portal. That’s down from a recent historical high of 183 in 2020.
Bibb said that Cleveland will again budget for 1,350 police officers this year. As recently as 2019, there were 1,550 officers on the force, a high water mark in recent years. According to the city, there are 1,218 officers currently, including recruits in training.
Working with Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance
Bibb, who often put in time in Washington, D.C., to build ties with the Biden administration, said he hoped to meet with Trump after the president takes office.
The mayor said he would work with the Trump administration on areas of agreement while opposing the new president where they disagree. (For instance, Bibb, who served a term as chair of Climate Mayors, said after the election that he would continue to support expanding green energy and reducing carbon emissions under a Trump administration.)
The new president should support mayors by investing in police, violence interruptors and out-of-school programs, Bibb said.
Asked whether Cleveland police would cooperate with Trump’s plans to ramp up deportations, the mayor signaled that he wouldn’t stand in the way of law enforcement detaining undocumented immigrants who had committed crimes.
“If you are an illegal immigrant committing crimes in this country, you should be held accountable like any other resident or citizen in this country,” Bibb said. “If there are illegals in Ohio or illegals in Cleveland committing crimes, we will hold them accountable.”
Bibb said Cleveland would still welcome refugees and immigrants — and that Congress and the Trump administration should pass “common-sense immigration reform.” Democrats ought to embrace Obama’s 2008 immigration platform, he said. Obama’s position mixed support for a border fence with backing for a pathway to legalization for undocumented immigrants who paid fines and learned English.
Debate over Cleveland school closures on the horizon
Voters solidly passed a tax increase for the Cleveland Metropolitan School District last year. But that levy did not resolve the Cleveland schools’ long-term financial instability. Bibb said difficult choices await him and district leadership.
One set of choices is whether to close school buildings with low student populations. Bibb did not say how many buildings might need to close or when those closures might happen. The mayor said CMSD CEO Warren Morgan and the board would chart a path forward in consultation with students, parents, teachers, business leaders and City Council.
“It’s very clear that we have some buildings in our city, in our footprint at CMSD, that are way too big with not enough students,” Bibb said.
