Chicago Mayor Security Detail: Size, Costs, and Controversies

The Chicago mayor’s security detail, formally designated Unit 544 within the Chicago Police Department, has reportedly grown to nearly 100 officers under Mayor Brandon Johnson, according to figures from the Chicago Office of Inspector General’s staffing dashboard.¹ The unit guards the mayor, the mayor’s family, City Hall, and the mayor’s residence, and its size has become a political flashpoint at a time when the CPD is carrying roughly 1,000 vacancies and the administration is cutting sworn positions to save money.²

How Big the Detail Is and How It Grew

Chicago mayors have kept CPD bodyguard details for decades, but the modern unit is a recent creation. Richard M. Daley’s detail during his 22-year tenure ran about 24 officers. Rahm Emanuel said he intended to keep a smaller detail than Daley’s, though the city refused to release numbers.³

About a year into Lori Lightfoot’s term, in 2020, CPD created Unit 544, the Government Security Detail, to consolidate protection for City Hall, the mayor’s residence, and the personal bodyguard command post. By March 2022, Unit 544 had 65 officers, five sergeants, and one lieutenant.⁴ By May 2023, it had grown to 90 sworn officers, on top of a separate personal bodyguard detail of roughly 20 officers that Lightfoot maintained.⁵

Under Johnson, the reported headcount is close to 100. Gun-rights groups have circulated higher figures, as many as 150 officers and an estimated $30 million a year, though those numbers have not been confirmed by city records or independent reporting.⁶ CPD has consistently refused to release precise staffing numbers for any security detail, citing safety.⁷

Why the Detail Is Controversial

The size of Unit 544 is politically charged because it sits against a shrinking department. Over an 18-month stretch, the Johnson administration eliminated 456 CPD vacancies — 98 sworn and 358 civilian — to save more than $50 million.¹ Since 2019, the department has 1,600 fewer positions overall.² Johnson’s 2025 budget proposal included further cuts to police positions and a nearly 30 percent reduction in staffing for CPD training and mental health divisions. An Illinois Policy Institute poll found 73 percent of Chicago voters wanted a larger police presence, and 66 percent disapproved of the mayor’s handling of crime.

Critics have pointed to the CTA’s Voluntary Special Employment Program, which puts sworn officers on transit shifts on their days off, as a scale comparison. That program averaged 77 officers per day in early 2026, with plans to increase to 120.⁸ Gun-rights groups have argued that one elected official’s protection rivals or exceeds the police presence across Chicago’s entire public transit system.⁶

Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 7 President John Catanzara has been the loudest critic. In a video recorded outside the mayor’s Austin neighborhood home in September 2025, Catanzara pointed to three squad cars parked at the residence around the clock and called Johnson a “hypocrite” for using that protection while publicly describing law enforcement as “a sickness” to be “eradicated.” Catanzara was responding to remarks Johnson made at a City Hall press conference on September 16, 2025, when the mayor said, “Jails and incarceration and law enforcement is a sickness that has not led to safe communities.”⁹

The National Shooting Sports Foundation and the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action have framed the detail as a Second Amendment issue, saying Johnson maintains extensive armed protection for himself while backing some of Illinois’ most restrictive firearm laws, including the state’s ban on certain semi-automatic weapons and magazine restrictions.¹⁰

The Drunk-on-Duty Incident

The detail drew national attention in May 2025 when the Chicago Tribune reported that Officer Josue Najera, 44, a member of Johnson’s security team since August 2023, had reported for duty intoxicated on January 20, 2025, the night of President Donald Trump’s second inauguration.¹¹

Najera had attended an inauguration viewing event at the Trump International Hotel and Tower before his 9 p.m.-to-6 a.m. shift guarding the mayor’s West Superior Street residence. At roughly 7 p.m., before that shift began, he allegedly tried to sit in an on-duty officer’s squad car and, when turned away, filed a complaint against that officer.¹² When he did arrive for the shift, his sergeant described his behavior as “very uncharacteristic and erratic.” Asked whether he had been drinking, Najera said, “Yes.” A breathalyzer at the 15th District station at 11:46 p.m. registered a blood alcohol content of .134.¹¹

His gun was confiscated and his police powers were stripped. He was ordered to surrender his ID, badge, and hat shield, and was issued a 25-day suspension. As of May 2025 he had not yet served it and had been reassigned to CPD’s Alternate Response Section.¹¹ Najera had no sustained misconduct complaints before the incident. Both CPD and the mayor’s office declined to comment.¹²

Travel Costs and FOIA Redactions

Records obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request by NBC 5 Investigates offered a look at how the detail travels. When Johnson flew to Los Angeles in February 2024 for an African American Mayors Association conference and stayed to attend the Grammy Awards, seven city employees went with him, four of them security detail officers. A mayoral spokesman called a four-officer travel contingent “standard.”¹³

Documented costs for airfare, lodging, and travel agency fees totaled $7,949.96, but the true figure is likely higher. The city redacted rental car expenses and an entire page of charges, citing “privacy concerns.” David Greising of the Better Government Association said the heavy redactions fit “a pattern of not being responsive to legitimate public interest.”¹³

What Happens to Former Mayors

Protection does not automatically end when a mayor leaves office. When administrations change, CPD conducts what it calls “security threat assessments” to decide whether an outgoing official still needs a detail, and if so how large.⁷ Daley left office with 24 officers; Emanuel cut that to five bodyguards and later reassigned those five, providing three officers for “occasional bodyguard services.”³ Lightfoot continued taxpayer-funded protection for Emanuel after a threat assessment, but eliminated the separate detail and vehicle assigned to his wife.⁵ Shortly after taking office in May 2023, Johnson “dramatically reduced” the detail at Lightfoot’s Logan Square home; neighbors reported the police presence shrank to a single squad car.

The Budget Backdrop

The detail sits inside a strained police budget. CPD’s total 2026 budget is $2.1 billion, up $37.9 million from the prior year.² Overtime has been a persistent problem: the city budgeted $100 million for police overtime in both 2023 and 2024, but actual spending hit roughly $283 million and $238 million, respectively.¹⁴ In December 2025, Johnson signed Executive Order 2025-11 imposing new controls on overtime after the City Council declined to pass a similar ordinance as part of the 2026 budget.¹⁵City of Chicago. Police Overtime Spending Executive Order

1
Chicago Tribune. Chicago Mayor Cuts Cops, Officers Protect Brandon Johnson
2
WTTW News. After City Council Rejects Effort to Crack Down on CPD Overtime, Johnson Imposes New Limits
3
NBC Chicago. Bill for Burke, Daley Security
4
Chicago Sun-Times. Mayor Lightfoot Security Detail
5
Fox 32 Chicago. Former Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s Security Detail Dramatically Reduced
6
NRA-ILA. Anti-Gun Chicago Mayor Spends Astronomical Amounts of Tax Dollars on Armed Security
7
Chicago Sun-Times. Chicago Mayor Lightfoot Security Reduced
8
NBC Chicago. CTA, Chicago Police Unveil Security Surge After Feds Threatened Funding Cuts
9
Audacy WBBM. Police Union President Calls Chicago’s Mayor Hypocrite
10
NSSF. Chicago Mayor’s Taxpayer-Funded Security Hypocrisy
11
Chicago Tribune. Mayor Detail Suspended After Trump Inauguration Celebration
12
New York Post. Chicago Mayor’s Cop Security Showed Up for Work Drunk After Partying at Trump Tower
13
NBC Chicago. Newly Obtained Records Shed Light on Cost of Mayor Brandon Johnson’s Trip to Los Angeles
14
Chicago Tribune. More Money, Stricter Rules for Police Overtime Spending
15