Afternoon Briefing: DePaul's Doug Bruno stepping down
Good afternoon, Chicago.
DePaul women's basketball coach Doug Bruno is stepping down after 39 seasons and a 786-405 record at the helm of the program.
Bruno, who was inducted into the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame in 2022, will move into a new role with the Blue Demons as the Special Assistant to the Vice President/Director of Athletics for Women's Basketball on May 1. DePaul announced today it will begin a nationwide search for its new coach.
Here's what else is happening today. And remember, for the latest breaking news in Chicago, visit chicagotribune.com/latest-headlines and sign up to get our alerts on all your devices.
Kane coroner confirms remains found in car are those of missing Elgin woman Karen Schepers
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A federal judge temporarily blocks parts of Trump's anti-DEI executive orders
A federal judge has temporarily blocked the U.S. Department of Labor from implementing parts of President Donald Trump's executive orders aimed at curbing diversity, equity and inclusion efforts among federal contractors and grant recipients.
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San Francisco Chronicle
19 minutes ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Can schools like St. Bonaventure and FIU thrive in college athletics without the big bucks?
ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — As schools prepare to begin sharing millions with their athletes, there is no avoiding the reality that if you're not a Power Four school, you're at a disadvantage. With major conferences running the show, St. Bonaventure and Florida International don't even have a seat at the table. FIU and St. Bonaventure aren't necessarily worried about a head-to-head fight over top players with deeper-pocketed schools. The priority has become survival and finding a balance between athletics ambition and financial sustainability. Adrian Wojnarowski spoke candidly about the challenges he faced during his inaugural season as the general manager of the St. Bonaventure men's basketball team. Solidifying a recruiting class that would improve the team and embrace the school culture was not easy. After July 1, when lucrative paychecks will pretty much become mandatory for blue-chip prospects, it's not going to get any easier. With some 2,000 undergraduate students, the Bonnies are outnumbered in resources and revenue when competing even against other Atlantic 10 teams like VCU, Dayton, and Saint Louis. Wojnarowski, ESPN's former lead NBA reporter, thinks he has identified a formula for locating the ideal prospect. To him, St. Bonaventure is a landing spot for international players adjusting to a new culture and college life, transfers who may have fallen short at a high major and need development, or those looking to move up to a mid-major. He admits the school upstate New York could be a pit stop on a player's journey. 'I want them to see that our environment, our coaching staff, our small school, especially for international players coming over, what I really try to sell is your adjustment to American college life," he said at the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics and Affiliates Convention this week. 'I think for a lot of kids, it's easier in a school with 1,900 students than a school with 19,000. And you'll come to have two great years with us, and then you'll probably end up at schools with 19,000 or 29,000,' he said. "And so you're selling, for us, we're your first step on the way to somewhere else, or the other one to me is we're the place to come when you've got to get the basketball right.' If the plan goes awry and a recruit slips away, one thing the former NBA insider refuses to do is blame the money. 'Fundraising is hard, creating new revenue streams is hard, but the one thing that I try to stay away from with us is not saying, 'Oh, we didn't get him because they offered more money,' and using that as a crutch all the time. I really examine when we lost a player,' Wojnarowski said. 'Are we being honest with ourselves in saying that we did everything outside the economics to make our case to this person?' FIU has more than 40,000 undergraduates, but the athletic department is using a similar philosophy, pinpointing advantages and opportunities to come from the settlement instead of the negatives. Similar to St. Bonaventure, FIU doesn't expect to come close to the $20.5 million revenue-sharing cap available over the next year. For a competitive edge, unlocking new revenue streams is fundamental. 'To compete, from a revenue standpoint, you have to think outside the box of your conventional fundraising and targeting donors,' senior associate athletic director Joseph Corey said. 'That's why you're looking at concerts being held at different venues, different festivals to generate extra revenue to bring in, different revenue streams, and not just fundraising going after the same donors. You've got to go beyond that in order to be able to compete.' Being based in Miami has its perks. Proximity to celebrities is one of them. In August, FIU secured a 10-year partnership with Pitbull, the singer and rapper who coins himself 'Mr. 305.' 'We did the partnership with Pitbull – Pitbull Stadium. He's on tour, but part of the deal was that he would be collaborating with us and doing events for us from a fundraising standpoint," Corey said. "You've got to think outside the box. Especially in a city like Miami, it's about the experience too.' Schools unlocking creative revenue streams is something that can be expected. FIU competes in Conference USA alongside teams like Liberty, Louisiana Tech, UTEP, Kennesaw State and Jacksonville State. The football team went 3-5 in 2024, finishing sixth in the conference. The men's basketball team finished last with a 3-15 conference record. It's hard to sell donors on losing teams. 'Let's call it what it is, FIU's not going to be able to keep up with the Alabama's of the world, the Georgia's, Michigan, or Texas, but what can we do? We can be the best in our conference. That is our goal,' Corey said. 'Let's be the best in our conference and really compete there because once you're at the top of your conference, that means more revenue in other areas. Everyone wants to donate to a winner.'
New York Post
26 minutes ago
- New York Post
Congress demands investigation into billionaire funding radical groups, including one linked to LA riots
A shadowy US billionaire who is bankrolling radicals, including groups involved in this week's riots in Los Angeles, faces being hauled before a Congressional committee, according to a Republican lawmaker. China-based Neville Roy Singham will be called to testify about his funding of myriad non-profits including radical anti-Israel and Marxist groups. They include the Party for Liberation and Socialism, which has been heavily involved in protest against US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in Los Angeles this week, although there is no evidence they have been directly involved in any of the violence which has erupted there. Advertisement 6 The Party for Socialism and Liberation was among the radical left-wing groups that helped organize the riots against ICE in Los Angeles this week. Toby Canham for NY Post 'If he refuses to appear, he will be subpoenaed, and if he ignores that he will be referred to the DOJ for prosecution,' said Florida Rep. Anna Paulina Luna in a post on X in all capital letters earlier this week. The congressional committee will be looking at Singham's links to the Chinese Communist Party, according to Luna. Advertisement 6 Radical philanthropists Jodie Evans (center) and husband Roy Singham attend the 2016 TriBeCa film fstival with film producer Abigail Disney. WireImage 6 Elias Rodriguez, the suspect in the murder of two Israeli embassy staffers in Washington DC, participated in an anti-police brutality demonstration organized by the Party for Socialism and Liberation in 2017. Katie Kalisher via Storyful In April, the Senate Committee on the Judiciary urged the Department of Justice to investigate the People's Forum and Code Pink, leftist activist groups affiliated with Singham and his wife Jodie Evans. Born in Chicago, the software entrepreneur and his activist wife now live in Shanghai but still funnel plenty of money back to the US. Advertisement Although they deny working for the Chinese government, they share offices with the Maku Group, a propaganda network which promotes the Chinese Communist Party abroad. 6 Jodie Evans is a co-founder of Code Pink, a women's anti-war group that also promotes North Korea. Getty Images for MoveOn 'Evidence suggests that The People's Forum and Code Pink have been funded and influenced by … Singham and the communist Chinese government, both of which are foreign principals. 'The evidence also suggests that The People's Forum and Code Pink have engaged in political activities that directly advance the communist Chinese government's political and policy interests,' said committee chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa). Advertisement 6 Republican Representative Anna Paulina Luna has demanded that Neville Singham appear before her Oversight Committee to answer questions about his links to the Chinese Communist Party. AP Last year, the House Ways and Committee asked the IRS to revoke the exempt status for the People's Forum, a Manhattan-based non-profit financed by Singham. That group helped organize anti-Israel demonstrations in the city a day after the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israel that left 1,200 Israelis dead. Some of the group's members were also behind the violent demonstrations at an encampment for Gaza at Columbia University last year. 'The Singham network operates as a coordinated movement incubator, a term used by the People's Forum itself,' said Alex Goldberg, senior advisor to the National Contagion Research Institute, a think tank that tracks disinformation on social media platforms. 'It combines media, publishing and organizing under one roof.' Most of the groups linked to Singham operate out of a Chelsea, New York, office and cafe where People's Forum regularly offers courses with titles such as 'Racial Capitalism' and 'Spanish for Social Justice.' 6 The protests against ICE in Los Angeles this week were partly organized by the Party for Socialism and Liberation. Toby Canham for NY Post Among the Singham-linked non-profits are BreakThrough News and a radical book publishing company, 1804 Books. Advertisement 'These groups do not operate independently,' Goldberg told The Post. 'They share leadership, funding, and a unified ideological mission closely aligned with the Party for Socialism and Liberation, a revolutionary Marxist organization, expanding its presence on college campuses and in major cities.' The Party for Socialism and Liberation was recently tied to Elias Rodriguez, the suspect in the shooting deaths of two Israeli embassy staffers in Washington DC last month. In 2017, Rodriguez attended a police brutality demonstration as part of the radical socialist group, which immediately distanced itself from him in the wake of the shooting. Singham, 71, has not always been against the accumulation of capital. He is the founder and former chair of Thoughworks, a tech consulting company which he sold to a private equity firm in 2017 for $785 million. 'Roy Singham is incredibly charismatic,' said a source who did not want to be identified. Advertisement Evans, 70, co-founded the anti-war group Code Pink, and sits on the board of the People's Forum. She is the co-author of 'China is not our enemy,' written with Mikaela Nhondo Erskog, a researcher at another group funded by Singham. In another extreme example, Evans and another activist with Code Pink traveled to North Korea in 2015 as part of a delegation of 'Women Cross DMZ,' a pro-North Korean non-profit based in Hawaii.
Yahoo
34 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Karoline Leavitt gets fiery as she's pressed on Trump's military response to Los Angeles protests
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt got into a heated back and forth with reporters on Wednesday as she held her first briefing since President Donald Trump' federalized the National Guard in California and sent active-duty Marines to join them in cracking down on protests and unrest over immigration roundups in Los Angeles. Leavitt condemned the protests as 'shameful,' citing what she described as 'left-wing radicals waving foreign flags' who she accused of 'viciously attacking' Immigrations and Customs Enforcement officers and Border Patrol agents as well as Los Angeles Police Department officers as part of an assault on 'American culture and society itself.' Leavitt also condemned Democratic elected officials in the Golden State, specifically Gov. Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, accusing them of having 'shamefully failed to meet their sworn obligations to their citizens' by not ordering a forceful military response to protesters. She also lauded Trump for ordering the 'mob' of protesters to be 'stamped out.' 'The criminals responsible will be swiftly brought to justice, and the Trump administration's operations to arrest illegal aliens are continuing unabated,' Leavitt said. She added that Newsom and Bass had sided 'with illegal alien criminals in their communities and violent rioters and looters over law enforcement officers who are just doing their jobs.' But Leavitt's pugnacious attacks on California leaders did not satisfy reporters, who repeatedly asked her about the extent to which the military service members who've been deployed in Los Angeles are authorized to aid in immigration law enforcement, nor did she fully explain how Trump's threats to use 'very big force' against protesters at his planned military parade in D.C. this weekend comport with America's constitutional guarantees of free speech. She also aggressively denied that the immigration crackdown that precipitated the protests and violence over the weekend had been ordered up in an effort to change the national conversation from Trump's messy split with billionaire Elon Musk, the Tesla and SpaceX boss who wrapped up a stint as an unpaid adviser to the administration late last month. Asked about the possibility that Trump's crackdown was meant as a distraction to their social media war, Leavitt replied: 'That's an incredibly disingenuous attack.' She said Trump had been moved by 'images of border patrol and ICE agents being hailed with rocks and Molotov cocktails' and 'vehicles being burned to the ground with illegal aliens flying foreign flags.' Leavitt's press briefing came less than a day after Trump threatened to forcibly put down any protests that spoil the military parade he has ordered up for his birthdayon Saturday to coincide with the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Army's founding during the American Revolutionary War. During a media availability in the Oval Office on Tuesday, the president warned that any protests of the parade would be 'met with very big force' on Saturday. He reiterated the explicit threat a moment later, telling 'those people who want to protest' that they would be 'met with very big force' once more. He also opined further that any protest against the parade on Saturday would consist only of 'people who hate our country.' The president has a long history of pushing for the use of state violence against protests, which he considers to be a personal affront and a reflection of weakness on his part. During protests for racial justice in Washington following the May 2020 murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis, Minnesota police officer, he reportedly pushed to have military and law enforcement open fire on other protesters, asking then his then-Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman, General Mark Milley, why National Guard troops deployed as a result of the demonstrations could not shoot protesters in the legs. But Leavitt denied that Trump has any intention of attacking protests against his parade or his policies this weekend. Seemingly ignorant of the president's history of urging violence against demonstrations, Leavitt claimed the president 'supports the right of Americans to peacefully protest' and 'supports the First Amendment' while suggesting that the protests in Los Angeles have consisted entirely of 'mobs of violent rioters and agitators assaulting law enforcement officers, assaulting our federal immigration authorities.' 'Thankfully, the President took action and stepped in to protect our federal law enforcement agents, to perfect protect federal buildings, to protect the federal mission of deporting illegal criminals off of our streets, and that mission will continue every day, as far as we're concerned,' she said.
