NEW: Ex-Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot Sued Over Unpaid Credit Card Bill

Former Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot is facing a legal action initiated by JPMorgan Chase Bank concerning an unpaid credit card balance.

The lawsuit, filed in Cook County Circuit Court, alleges that Lightfoot failed to settle approximately $11,078 in outstanding debt. According to court records, the complaint was submitted late last year, and Lightfoot was served with the summons at her Chicago residence this past October.

The allegations center on Lightfoot’s credit card account with the bank. The suit claims that she did not make payments sufficient to cover the balance and failed to object to the final account statement issued prior to the debt being designated as a charge-off.

A charge-off occurs when a creditor deems the debt uncollectible and removes it from active accounts, often leading to collection efforts. In this case, the bank declared the debt a charge-off in March 2025, following what was reported as her last payment of $5,000 in August 2024.

Such action typically follows several months of non-payment, after which the account is handed over for recovery. The lawsuit seeks to recover the full amount owed, plus any applicable fees or interest, though specific additional costs were not detailed in available records, according to a report from local outlet KATV.

Then-Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot speaks at the MacLean Center on April 24, 2018
Photo: MacLean Center

Lightfoot, who served as Chicago’s 56th mayor from 2019 to 2023, has been involved in various professional roles since leaving office. She currently holds positions as a visiting professor at the University of Michigan’s Ford School of Public Policy, and she teaches at Harvard University and the University of Chicago’s Institute of Politics.

Her financial history, as disclosed in past tax returns, shows an adjusted gross income of $402,414 in 2021, supplemented by early distributions from retirement accounts totaling $210,000 that year. Prior to her mayoral tenure, while working as a partner at the law firm Mayer Brown, her average adjusted gross income from 2014 to 2017 was $971,626, according to a report from the Chicago Tribune.

Lightfoot has not yet issued a statement on the credit card case, nor has JPMorgan Chase.

The former mayor has recently faced scrutiny from the federal government over her efforts to create a “database” of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents. “We want to create a centralized archive of all the purported criminal actions of ICE and CBP agents,” Lightfoot said of her new website. “We want to create a portal where what’s happening real time can be centralized and put out for the public to view.”

Attorney General Pam Bondi told Fox News that the DOJ sent a legal notice to Lightfoot instructing her to preserve all relevant records to the formation of the database, adding that the department was probing for potential criminal wrongdoing.

“She will be getting a letter from us tomorrow to preserve anything that she’s done, as well to make sure that she’s not violating the law. It appears she is. You cannot disclose the identity of a federal agent, where they live, anything that could harm them,” the attorney general said.

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