For a fleeting moment, President Barack Obama almost had an airport he could call his own.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel floated the idea of renaming one of the city's two airports after Chicago's favorite son at a candidate forum Wednesday night,
the Chicago Tribune reports.
Answering a question about why he abandoned efforts to name a new North Side high school after Obama, and the South Side’s Stony Island Parkway after the late civic leader Arthur Brazier, Emanuel said he was still looking for ways to "acknowledge people who have done significant things."
"We have an airport, two of them, named after, you know, Midway Airport, O’Hare Airport,” Emanuel said. "These are people who have been transformative in the city of Chicago. But we have airports named after battleships."
The Tribune points out O’Hare is actually named after WWII Navy pilot Edward "Butch" O’Hare, and Midway was named by city officials in remembrance of the 1942 Battle of Midway.
After the forum, Emanuel spokeswoman Kelley Quinn told the Tribune the mayor has no plans to rename either airport.
Emanuel, who previously served as Obama’s White House chief of staff, confessed it was a mistake to choose a high school in the North Side to bear the president’s name, since Obama lived in Hyde Park, on the city’s South Side, the Tribune reports.
"I think President Obama is a great president," Emanuel said. "I wanted to honor him. I wanted to be the city to have the first high school named after him.
"In my rush to do it, I clearly offended people, so I backed off of it. I will never back off of my love and affection for a great president. But I made a mistake."
Emanuel is polling ahead of challenger Jesus "Chuy" Garcia ahead of their runoff election April 7.
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