Category: Chicago Politics

• Chicago Mayor Assassination (Anton Cermak)

  The Chicago Mayor Assassination theory held that Anton Cermak was not merely the accidental victim of Giuseppe Zangara’s failed attempt on Franklin D. Roosevelt, but the real target of a contract killing tied to organized crime. In the strongest form, Zangara was either a hired shooter or a useful screen for a more directed hit arranged by interests threatened by Cermak’s anti-racketeering posture and political consolidation in Chicago. The historical basis was real enough to sustain the suspicion: Cermak was wounded during the Roosevelt attempt in Miami on February 15, 1933, later died, and rumors linking the attack to Capone-era underworld politics circulated quickly. The conspiracy version made Miami not the scene of a missed presidential killing, but of a successful gang assassination.