Helen Gym makes it official and launches a run for Philadelphia mayor on a pledge to address gun violence

Former City Councilmember Helen Gym announced Wednesday that she will run for Philadelphia mayor on a pledge to address the city’s alarmingly high rate of gun violence, saying, “Everything is at stake right now.”

In remarks to a room of about 350 supporters gathered at the William Way LGBT Community Center, Gym centered her message on public safety, vowing to declare a state of emergency on her first day in office and prioritize improving homicide clearance rates.

But while the longtime activist who is typically aligned with the Democratic Party’s left wing said violence is “destroying our city and our people,” she was far from taking a tough-on-crime tone.

“I will not use this crisis to roll back the clock on civil rights,” she said. “While many people in this race will talk about public safety, let me be clear: Decades of systemic racism and disinvestment brought us to this place.”

The two-term Council member’s foray into the race comes a day after she resigned her at-large seat and punctuated a mayoral primary campaign that now features at least eight Democrats spanning the ideological spectrum, from pro-business and tough-on-crime centrists to Gym, an unabashed progressive.

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Gym is one of the last Democrats widely expected to get in the race to make it official. Also running are former Councilmembers Cherelle Parker, Maria Quiñones Sánchez, Allan Domb, and Derek Green, as well as ex-City Controller Rebecca Rhynhart and retired Judge James DeLeon. Grocer Jeff Brown announced his candidacy earlier in November, and State Rep. Amen Brown is considering entering the race.

Councilmember David Oh is considering running on the Republican side. The Democrat who prevails in the May primary is favored to replace term-limited Mayor Jim Kenney, given Philadelphia’s heavily Democratic electorate.

The candidates will spend the coming months debating a host of issues Philadelphians will expect the next mayor to tackle, including fears of an impending recession, a shortage of municipal workers, and a stubbornly high rate of shootings that skyrocketed in 2020 and has persisted since.

The contours of that debate began to come into focus Wednesday even before Gym officially announced. Hours before her planned event, Green released a statement contrasting himself with her and saying Gym “pushes a socialist agenda to raise taxes, and opposes more funding for the police.”

Gym has opposed tax cuts for businesses and corporations, and has been critical of the Police Department, championing legislation to ban the use of tear gas on protesters and rejecting calls to bring back stop-and-frisk. In 2020, she voted against a planned increase to the Police Department’s budget — along with a majority of Council, including Green.

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In her remarks Wednesday, Gym touted that she had a hand in pushing the city to send mental-health providers to some 911 calls, a move meant to reduce law enforcement’s interactions with people in crisis. And she pressed for antiviolence investments outside law enforcement, pledging to fund libraries and recreation centers to be open on nights and weekends.

Her announcement attracted a handful of progressive city officials, including City Councilmembers Jamie Gauthier and Kendra Brooks, State Reps. Rick Krajewski and Elizabeth Fiedler, as well as leaders of the Working Families Party, a progressive third party that has endorsed Gym in the past.

Philadelphia Federation of Teachers president Jerry Jordan was also there but said his presence didn’t constitute an endorsement.

Gym will likely compete for the support of the city’s teachers’ union, of which she was once a member. Her two campaigns for Council have centered on schools, and she leaned on her education record Wednesday, saying her work as a legislator improved conditions for school students and workers.

“We have proven we do hard things,” she said. “This is our call to action.”