More than a year after Empire star Jussie Smollett perpetrated the hoax heard ’round the world, Chicago’s Democrat Mayor Lori Lightfoot finally accepted the obvious: he did the crime, he needs to do the time. This represented a key reversal for the Democrat, who had long said she wanted to put the Smollett episode behind her.
“He needs to face the charges. He committed a crime, and he needs to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, and we are going to continue to aggressively make him accountable for the wasted police resources that went into investigating what turned out to be a total hoax,” Lightfoot said on Sunday.
Last January, Smollett infamously claimed that masked white attackers wearing MAGA hats screamed, “This is MAGA country!” before seizing him, putting a noose around his neck, and pouring an unknown bleach-scented liquid on him. This supposedly happened on one of the coldest nights of the year, when Chicago was colder than Antarctica. Police later discovered evidence Smollett had paid Nigerian brothers Olabinjo “Ola” Osundairo and Abimbola “Abel” Osundairo to attack him. Unearthed evidence included receipts showing the brothers buying the rope used in the attack and a check Smollett gave them.