
Daywatch: The cost to fix Chicago's water mains
Good morning, Chicago.
Scores of water mains throughout Chicago are too close to sewer lines, according to a new report that cautions the potential risks to public health could cost taxpayers millions of dollars to fix.
In a six-page letter released yesterday, Inspector General Deborah Witzburg slammed the Department of Water Management for failing to ensure contractors complied with state and city regulations intended to prevent human and industrial waste from tainting drinking water.
Witzburg said experts told her investigators that the level of pressure maintained in underground water mains likely thwarted any contamination. But she urged the city to improve its communication with Chicagoans, in particular when sections of the system malfunction and boil orders are issued.
Read the full story from the Tribune's Michael Hawthorne.
Here are the top stories you need to know to start your day.
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While Gov. JB Pritzker delivered a no-new-taxes, belt-tightening spending proposal for Illinois, the prospective presidential contender spoke to a larger, national audience by likening the actions of President Donald Trump and his followers to the rise of Nazism in 1930s Germany.
Painting a brighter picture of the state's finances than his administration had last year, when a $3.2 billion budget hole was said to loom, Pritzker's $55.2 billion plan for the year beginning July 1 includes required funding increases for schools and pension contributions. But the proposal keeps spending flat in most other areas, including programs favored by the second-term Democrat and his allies in the General Assembly.
American Airlines is planning to boost flying capacity out of O'Hare International Airport this year, marking a departure from the airline's pullback at its Chicago hub in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The carrier will fly to nine new domestic and international cities from Chicago in 2025 and use larger planes, American announced Thursday.
Indiana House legislators gave initial approval to a bill aimed at redrawing the Indiana-Illinois border Wednesday, but the bill continues to open up a Pandora's box of amendments — from marijuana legalization to allowing Indiana counties to secede.
Bill that places restrictions on Medicaid advances to Indiana House
Indiana House passes ban on transgender women participating in women's college sports
After years of litigation, Endeavor Health has settled the last batch of pending lawsuits filed by patients who allege they were sexually abused by former obstetrician/gynecologist Dr. Fabio Ortega – bringing the total number of lawsuits the health system has settled over the matter to more than 75.
Read the investigation on sexual abuse by providers
The AIDS Foundation Chicago and two other nonprofits filed a lawsuit against President Donald Trump and his administration, challenging executive orders related to diversity, equity and gender.
The AIDS Foundation Chicago, the National Urban League and the National Fair Housing Alliance filed the lawsuit in federal court in Washington, D.C., seeking to halt three recent executive orders.
After spending nearly six years in six courts, the legal battle between the Forest County Potawatomi Community of Wisconsin and the city of Waukegan is likely over after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit put an end to the last pending case.
Chicago Cubs left-hander Shota Imanaga is excited about his first opening-day start, made more special by the fact it's at the Tokyo Dome in Japan.
Former Illinois guard Terrence Shannon Jr. is trying to create something positive out of the school's upside-down banner mishap over the weekend.
As if Chicago didn't have enough problems. Here comes Godzilla, as in Gojira, the Big G, Tokyo's Own.
Apple has released a sleeker and more expensive version of its lowest priced iPhone in an attempt to widen the audience for a bundle of artificial intelligence technology that the company has been hoping will revive demand for its most profitable product lineup.
The iPhone 16e unveiled yesterday is the fourth-generation of a model that's sold at a dramatically lower price than the iPhone's standard and premium models.
Chicago first embraced this Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice irreverent Biblical creation with the help of some 500 performances from a bare-chested Donny Osmond back in the mid-1990s.
Any show that was so successful for so long in downtown Chicago that an Osmond was persuaded to move himself and his family to Wilmette is a piece of theater that deserves respect, writes Tribune theater critic Chris Jones.
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The move, widely condemned by his critics, follows Trump's federalization of the National Guard. Some 3,800 guardsmen have since been deployed in California against the objections of its government, spurring debate among legal observers over the limits of the president's power to send troops into American streets. Trump ordered the deployments in response to thousands of Angelenos who took to the streets on Friday in protests. LA residents responded after Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents carried out sweeping raids of local businesses, arresting, among others, dozens of day laborers who were vying for work outside a local Home Depot. Larger demonstrations soon formed and remained largely peaceful until residents were engaged by police with riot shields and crowd control weapons. Over the weekend, the clashes between police and protesters escalated across many neighborhoods with large immigrant populations. Numerous buildings were vandalized with anti-ICE messages, and several Waymo autonomous vehicles were set ablaze. Videos captured by protest attendees show police firing upon demonstrators with rubber bullets and other crowd control agents, including waves of asphyxiating CS gas. Members of the press shared images online showing injuries they incurred from the police assault. In widely shared footage, a Los Angeles police officer appears to intentionally target an Australian reporter, Lauren Tomasi, shooting her from feet away with a rubber bullet as she delivers a monologue into a camera. On Monday, CNN correspondent Jason Carroll was arrested live on air. California governor Gavin Newsom condemned Trump's troop deployment in posts on social media, calling the president's actions an 'unmistakable step toward authoritarianism.' 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While these powers are most often invoked at the request of a state government, the president may also invoke the act when a state chooses to ignore the constitutional rights of its inhabitants—as happened multiple times in the mid-20th century, when southern states refused to desegregate schools after the Supreme Court's landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision. President Trump, however, has so far not invoked the Insurrection Act, relying instead on a theory of 'inherent authority' advanced by the US Justice Department in 1971 during the height of the anti–Vietnam War protests. This interpretation of presidential power finds that troops may be deployed in an effort to 'protect federal property and functions.' Notably—unlike the Insurrection Act—this does not permit troops to engage in activities that are generally the purview of civilian law enforcement agencies. Trump also invoked statutory power granted to him by Congress under Title 10 of the US Code, which enabled him to federalize elements of California's National Guard. These activations typically occur when guardsmen are needed to support overseas military operations, as happened routinely this century during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Domestically, however, guardsmen are not usually federalized without the agreement of a state's governor—unless the Insurrection Act has been invoked. Legal experts interviewed by WIRED offered a range of opinions on the president's authority to deploy active-duty military troops or federalize the National Guard. 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In essence, the memo 'authorizes the deployment of federal troops anywhere in the country,' Goitein says, 'including places where there are no protests yet. We're talking about preemptive deployment.' Goitein argues that the administration's justifications could undermine both judicial accountability and civil‑military boundaries. Under the Insurrection Act, federal troops can take on the responsibilities of local and state police. But without it, their authority should be quite limited. Neither the guardsmen nor the Marines, for instance, should engage with protesters acting peacefully, according to Goitein. 'He says they're there to protect federal property,' she says. 'But it looks a lot like quelling civil unrest.' Anthony Kuhn, a 28-year US Army veteran and managing partner at Tully Rinckey, believes, meanwhile, that there is really 'no question' that Trump would be justified in declaring a 'violent rebellion' underway in California, empowering him to ignore Newsom's objections. 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