'I leave now with my head held high': Oft-embattled Kim Foxx won't seek reelection

Cook County State's Attorney Kim Foxx announced she will not seek a third term as the leader of the nation's second-largest prosecutors' office.

“At the conclusion of my term in November 2024, I will be stepping down as state's attorney. I will not be on next year's ballot by my choice,” Foxx said Tuesday during remarks to the City Club of Chicago.

“I leave now with my head held high and my heart full knowing that better days are ahead,” said the Chicago native whose tenure as the first Black woman to serve as state's attorney has been marked by controversy.

Much of that controversy has to do with opposition to Foxx's criminal justice reform initiatives, including her support for the elimination of cash bail as part of the SAFE-T Act. She's also been criticized for not prosecuting low-level offenses, including possession of small amounts of marijuana and retail thefts under $1,000, as well as her efforts to vacate convictions of those wrongfully convicted or framed by corrupt police officers.

But her handling of the Jussie Smollett case earned her the harshest criticism.

In January 2019, the “Empire” actor claimed he was attacked by two men uttering racial and homophobic slurs. Police determined Smollett staged the attack, and Foxx's office charged him with disorderly conduct and filing a false police report.

About two weeks after a Cook County grand jury returned a 16-count indictment against Smollett, Foxx's offices dropped the charges. A Cook County judge appointed former U.S. Attorney Dan Webb as a special prosecutor to investigate why the charges were dropped. Webb subsequently obtained a six-count indictment against Smollett, who was convicted in December 2021 of five counts of disorderly conduct.

Concluding his investigation into the handling of the case by Foxx's office, Webb found a “substantial abuse of discretion” that “represented a major failure of the operations of the CCSAO.”

Webb also found evidence “that may rise to the level of a violation of legal ethics by State's Attorney Foxx and CCSAO lawyers relating to false and/or misleading public statements made about the prosecution and resolution” of the initial case.

However, Webb determined the evidence did not support criminal charges against Foxx or any other prosecutors.

Foxx referred to the case Tuesday, calling it a “Class 4, nonviolent felony of a D-list actor for a crime he committed against himself” and juxtaposing it with her success securing the release of wrongfully convicted people, several of whom attended the City Club event.

Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, in a prepared statement, praised Foxx for working to “prosecute the right people for the right crimes, restore public trust by addressing racial discrimination and wrongful convictions and serving the interests of victims of domestic violence.”

Foxx said she never intended to become a career politician and preferred standing in the background “watching my heroes fight the fight.” She aligned herself with prosecutors around the nation “who have taken up the mantra of safety, justice, fairness and reform” and have been recalled or removed for their efforts.

“I've been called radical. I've been called woke,” she said. “I'm not special in this.”

“I had a mission and agenda I wanted to achieve, which was fairness, justice and equity. I feel I've done that.”

Asked about the accomplishment of which she is most proud, Foxx commended assistant state's attorneys who do “the bread-and-butter work” of prosecuting violent crime.

“I'm most proud of the 1,200 people who work there,” she said. “No matter whose face is on the door they're showing up to administer justice ... And I'm proud that even when people try to diminish me in the name of something political, they don't waiver.”