Daywatch: Not your grandparents' City Council
Good morning, Chicago.
When Ald. Scott Waguespack started his City Council career as an opponent of Mayor Richard M. Daley, it was mostly at the wrong end of a bunch of lopsided votes.
But his days as one of five aldermen who said no to Daley's infamous parking meter deal or a quixotic early thorn to Mayor Rahm Emanuel are long gone.
Now, when the Northwest Side alderman butts heads with Mayor Brandon Johnson, he is often one of many across a relatively broad political spectrum, and sometimes he even gets his way.
'You see more accountability and more responsibility that's shared now than in the past,' he said. 'I think you're seeing people kind of trust in each other.'
It's a sea change that grew under Mayor Lori Lightfoot, and is gaining momentum in City Hall with Johnson: The City Council, long derided as a mayoral puppet, is increasingly operating independent of the fifth floor.
The shift follows the demise of Chicago's infamous machine politics. It also tracks with the ascension of the aldermanic Progressive Caucus and the 'Common Sense Caucus' formed in part to oppose it, both shifting groups that bring more ideological force into debates.
Read the full story from the Tribune's Jake Sheridan.
Here are the top stories you need to know to start your day, including the never-built migrant tent encampment the state agreed to pay $1.3 million for, what's next on the docket for former House Speaker Michael Madigan after he was denied a motion for a new trial and our picks for where to go in Chicago for Father's Day.
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Another 2,000 National Guard troops along with 700 Marines are headed to Los Angeles on orders from President Donald Trump, escalating a military presence local officials and Gov. Gavin Newsom don't want and the police chief says creates logistical challenges for safely handling protests.
Editorial: MAGA morphs into Make America Cruel Again
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. yesterday removed every member of a scientific committee that advises the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on how to use vaccines and pledged to replace them with his own picks.
Used in COVID shots, mRNA may help rid the body of HIV
Despite assurances from Gov. JB Pritzker that state taxpayers would not end up footing the bill for a migrant tent encampment in Chicago that was never built, the state recently agreed to pay $1.3 million to the project's contractor.
A federal judge yesterday denied a motion by former House Speaker Michael Madigan seeking to overturn his recent conviction on bribery and other corruption counts, setting the stage for a high-stakes sentencing hearing later this week.
Michael Madigan, ComEd and corruption: How the investigation into the ex-Illinois Speaker unfolded
Speaking from the witness stand nearly a decade after her 7-year-old son was shot and killed, Amber Hailey said every court date has tested her resolve.
Her son, Amari Brown, was gunned down on the Fourth of July in 2015 in an act of violence that spurred national news coverage and calls for change. Those calls heightened just months later after the targeted killing of another child, 9-year-old Tyshawn Lee.
'Amari was an innocent child who had his whole life ahead of him,' Hailey said, breaking down in tears. 'He had his dreams, aspirations.'
The nascent sports network finally joined the Comcast lineup Friday, but on the higher-priced Ultimate tier, which costs an additional $20 per month, on top of the $20.25 regional sports network fee charged to Chicago-area subscribers each month.
In the wake of the deal, CHSN abruptly pulled the plug on local TV affiliates in Chicago, Rockford, Peoria, and Fort Wayne and South Bend, Indiana.
The Indianapolis Colts are moving forward with the late Jim Irsay's transition plan for ownership, which calls for his three daughters to take charge of the club.
The team said that Carlie Irsay-Gordon, Casey Foyt and Kalen Jackson each would continue to hold the title of owner, which they have done since 2012 when they were named vice chairs. Irsay-Gordon is now CEO, and Foyt is executive vice president. Jackson will be chief brand officer.
Southern Baptists meeting this week in Dallas will be asked to approve resolutions calling for a legal ban on pornography and a reversal of the U.S. Supreme Court's approval of same-sex marriage.
The proposed resolutions call for laws on gender, marriage and family based on what they say is the biblically stated order of divine creation. They also call for legislators to curtail sports betting and to support policies that promote childbearing.
Most big collections have only a fraction of their items on display, with the rest locked away in storage. But not at the new V&A East Storehouse, where London's Victoria and Albert Museum has opened up its storerooms for visitors to view — and in many cases touch — the items within. Anyone can book a one-on-one appointment with any object, from a Vivienne Westwood mohair sweater to a tiny Japanese netsuke figurine. Most of the items can even be handled, with exceptions for hazardous materials, such as Victorian wallpaper that contains arsenic.
While Mother's Day celebrations traditionally involve breakfast in bed or brunches with free-flowing mimosas plus gifts of flowers, it can be a little harder to figure out what to do for Father's Day. Luckily, local bars and restaurants are making planning easier by offering a wide range of events and specials with an emphasis on big steaks, beer and whiskey. Whether you think your dad would love a multi-course dinner with plenty of time to talk or to show off his skills in a putting competition, these 39 spots make it easy to enjoy some quality time together.
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Cuts to Medicaid for Ohioans with disabilities could take away home care and job help
(iStock / Getty Images Plus) As the Ohio Senate moves forward with its budget proposal, advocates for Medicaid are hoping changes can be made to avoid significant impacts to low income residents, elderly Ohioans, and people with disabilities. Funding from Medicaid allows 3 million Ohioans access to health care services, including more than 770,000 who receive them through the Medicaid expansion program instituted in 2014. That expansion program allows people who weren't eligible for the traditional Medicaid programs but were still in categories of need to access health care. The existence of that program dropped the uninsured rate in Ohio to historic levels, according to the Health Policy Institute of Ohio. Along with health care, Medicaid dollars help with services that aren't necessarily connected to medical treatment, like home care, employment help, transportation, and a direct care provider who helps with all of those things. 'In many cases, if there wasn't Medicaid dollars behind it, I know of many people whose ability to live outside of a hospital or in the community would be threatened,' said Jules Patalita, a disability rights advocate for Sylvania-based The Ability Center. So advocates were disappointed to see the Ohio Senate maintain a provision from both the Ohio House's and Gov. Mike DeWine's budget proposals that would eliminate the Medicaid expansion group if the federal government reduces their level of support (currently at 90%) by even 1%. 'This would be a substantial loss for many working Ohioans,' said Kathryn Poe, researcher for the think tank Policy Matters Ohio. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX Also included in the Senate's budget proposal is the elimination of a Medicaid waiver that 'would have provided continuous coverage for kids up to age 3,' Poe said, and a separate section of the budget that would 'allow the state to pause, eliminate or change other funds related to all other federal grants, should Congress adjust or eliminate funding for that program.' Poe did praise the Senate proposal for removing a House-submitted provision limiting Medicaid reimbursement for doulas to only six Ohio counties. 'This will ensure that Ohio parents continue to have access to culturally appropriate birthing resources and management,' Poe said. Concerns about loss of access don't just extend to physical health concerns or daily home services, but also to behavioral health services, on which 47% of Ohio adults on Medicaid rely, according to Kerstin Sjoberg, president and CEO of Disability Rights Ohio. 'If you don't have access to some sort of insurance like Medicaid, it's going to be almost impossible to get those services,' Sjoberg said. The state-level discussions come as federal budget reconciliation also touches on Medicaid funding as the Trump administration and Republicans in Congress attempt to slash federal spending by $880 billion over the next decade, particularly from public assistance programs like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and Medicaid. U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson and other leaders have talked about 'abuse' or 'fraud' as sources of revenue loss for the country in public programs, something those who engage with users of programs like Medicaid push back on. 'In reality, Medicaid is one of the most cost-effective and widely used safety nets in the country,' said the advocacy group Innovation Ohio in a call-to-action email over the congressional budget proposals. 'If this bill becomes law, the result will be fewer people with health care, more families pushed into poverty and deeper inequality. Rural hospitals could shut down.' According to a study by the Commonwealth Fund, Ohio could be one of the hardest hit economies if Medicaid cuts at the federal level come to fruition, cuts that could mean 29% more Medicaid spending by states or cuts to other programs, like education, to offset the Medicaid losses. One thing that will have to be addressed whether or not the cuts are realized in the state and federal budgets is the workforce that helps those who use Medicaid for home care and other services. Patalita said the word 'crisis' has been used in talking about the shortage of direct care providers, similar to the shortage of child care workers needed to provide adequate access to that service. 'We've talked to people who have had to wait weeks to be able to receive services in the home, because there just aren't enough providers out there,' Patalita said. The Ability Center did a study after the previous state budget increased the reimbursement rate for direct care providers under the state Medicaid program. That study showed that while reimbursements rates and, for that matter, provider wages should go up, the solution to the shortage problem wouldn't come with just one answer. 'The direct care crisis is too complex of an issue for a single action to remedy,' The Ability Center found. The study identified three 'major elements' of the shortage: high turnover rates, low hourly wages (lower than 'many entry level positions in retail and food service,' according to the study), and a lack of consistency in benefits. 'This failure by agencies to provide benefits adds to the worker shortage and forces those requiring home care to carry the burden of decreased access to care, especially those in rural areas,' the study found. Eliminating Medicaid funding, including the expansion group, will make life harder for those Ohioans who need the services, Sjoberg said, 'but it will also make it necessary that the direct care workforce is supported in other ways.' SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
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Editorial: Senate President Harmon's sly legislative maneuver exemplifies the need for campaign finance reform
Even lawmakers who've been around Springfield a long time were taken aback at the audacity of Senate President Don Harmon slipping a provision into a broader elections reform bill that would have gotten his campaign off the hook for a potential penalty well into the millions. The Senate president's problem stems from a March ruling by the Illinois State Board of Elections that his campaign had improperly accepted more than $4 million in donations in 2024 — a finding that stemmed from this newspaper's questions about the campaign's fundraising. If Harmon's appeal of that determination is unsuccessful, his campaign could be subject to a penalty as steep as $6.1 million. Harmon's language in the broader reform bill would have deemed the grounds for his campaign's appeal correct, both going forward . House Democrats concluded the provision would have ended the board's enforcement action, wiping the slate clean for the Harmon campaign. The Senate president's attempted slick move only confirmed what many voters already believe about Springfield — that those in power regularly speak in support of good government and clean campaigns but, when push comes to shove, do what they feel is necessary to preserve their authority. The maneuver deserved the condemnation it received — including from members of Harmon's own party. Thankfully, there was no vote on that elections reform package in the most recent session of the General Assembly. Beyond the unseemly legislative maneuvering, the Harmon story to our minds underscores how Springfield's past efforts at campaign finance have failed so miserably. The issue at the heart of Harmon's woes is a provision in the state's 2009 campaign finance reform law that was meant to neutralize the effect of big money on Illinois politics. Back then, worries about independently wealthy candidates effectively buying elections led state lawmakers to lift donation limits when 'self-funding' got to a certain level so that opponents could compete. Instead, that safeguard mainly has enabled party leaders like Harmon to collect sums well above the law's ordinary caps on individual contributions from politically connected, big-money donors like unions and other special interests. The law says that candidates who contribute their own money above a certain threshold — in the case of state lawmakers, it's $100,000 — no longer must abide by the donation limits (and neither must their opponents). The loophole is so flimsy that it permits those candidates to provide that cash as a loan and get repaid by the sizable sums that flow from the lifting of the caps. In this manner, Harmon uses the so-called millionaire's exemption in election cycle after election cycle, the Tribune reported. He's not alone. House Speaker Emanuel 'Chris' Welch has taken advantage of the same loophole, Alisa Kaplan, executive director of campaign watchdog Reform for Illinois, tells us. Republican leaders in the House and Senate have done so in the past as well. Before scandal forced him to retire in 2021, Michael Madigan routinely employed the same strategy as House speaker. Madigan awaits sentencing this coming Friday after being convicted in February of bribery and corruption charges. As broad as the exemption is, there are some limits. Harmon ran afoul of the law when his campaign collected amounts above the caps during a period of time it allegedly couldn't, according to the Board of Elections. Harmon says the board is misinterpreting the statute and has appealed. However the Harmon campaign affair is concluded, the bigger issue here is the loophole itself. It allows legislative leaders to evade campaign limits routinely and enables special interests to amass far too much influence over state policy through exorbitant donations. As Madigan so skillfully proved over his decades in power, caucus leaders exert immense influence over members by doling out funds in their campaign war chests, bankrolled by those special interests. This unholy alliance between the leaders and donors gives those deep-pocketed interests effective veto power over legislation they don't like. Why do so many problems facing the state seem so intractable? Look no further than this dynamic. Potential fixes don't come without tradeoffs. Eliminating the millionaire's exemption altogether would open the door again to uber-wealthy candidates (or super PACs controlled by rich individuals) gaining an unfair advantage. But there are some obvious steps Springfield should take. At the very least, an end should be put to making cap-busting donations in the form of loans. And the amount self-funders should have to front ought to be raised substantially from the $100,000 threshold currently applied to state legislative races. Reform for Illinois set forth other constructive suggestions — . They're no less relevant today. The Harmon campaign controversy will have done the urgent cause of campaign finance reform an unintended favor if it puts the millionaire's exemption on Springfield's agenda.
