Daywatch: Illinois lawmakers have mixed results in efforts to rein in AI
Illinois lawmakers have so far achieved mixed results in efforts to regulate the burgeoning technology of artificial intelligence, a task that butts up against moves by the Trump administration to eliminate restrictions on AI.
AI-related bills introduced during the spring legislative session covered areas including education, health care, insurance and elections. Supporters say the measures are intended to address potential threats to public safety or personal privacy and to counter any deceitful actions facilitated by AI, while not hindering innovation.
Although several of those measures failed to come to a vote, the Democratic-controlled General Assembly is only six months into its two-year term and all of the legislation remains in play. But going forward, backers will have to contend with Republican President Donald Trump's administration's plans to approach AI.
Read the full story from the Tribune's Jeremy Gorner.
Here are the top stories you need to know to start your day, including: the latest on a Logan Square stabbing and fire, what a Supreme Court ruling on birthright citizenship means for immigrant families in Chicago and how Pete Crow-Armstrong's impromptu thank-you speech brought the Wrigley Field community closer.
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With more rain on the way, the risk of life-threatening flooding was still high in central Texas today even as crews search urgently for the missing following a holiday weekend deluge that killed at least 82 people, including children at summer camps. Officials said the death toll was sure to rise.
U.S. News & World Report ranked Illinois 47th out of 50 states for nursing home quality, based on federal reports of health inspections, staffing and other quality measures. A 2019 analysis by Families for Better Care, a nonprofit advocacy group, ranked Illinois 49th.
And a Tribune search of records kept by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services showed Illinois has some 250 homes with a quality rating of just one star out of five.
A Logan Square woman now faces more than a dozen felony charges — including murder — in connection with a Fourth of July stabbing and fire that left one of her children dead and two others injured, authorities announced yesterday.
Wendy Tolbert, 45, was charged with murder, attempted murder, aggravated arson and several other felonies after she allegedly stabbed her three children — killing her 4-year-old son — and set their residence on fire Friday in the 3600 block of West Palmer Street, according to Chicago Police and Cook County prosecutors.
Late Wednesday night, assailants armed with at least one rifle rolled up outside an album release party for a local drill rapper in River North and opened fire on a crowd gathered on the sidewalk. Within a matter of seconds, police Superintendent Larry Snelling said, the attackers were able to shoot an astonishing 18 people, killing four in a spot close to the center of the city as Chicago is preparing for the holiday weekend and playing host to a high-profile NASCAR road race.
The shooting was among the city's worst in recent years and served as a warning that even though violent crime has fallen in recent years, gun violence — especially that fueled by rivalries on Chicago's splintered gang landscape — remains stubbornly persistent.
A Supreme Court decision limiting federal judges from issuing nationwide injunctions is expected to make it more difficult for blue states fighting President Donald Trump's executive orders to get widespread relief and could further stretch the resources of Illinois' attorney general's office as it pushes back against the administration.
Pregnant and living in Chicago without legal immigration status, Daniela Sigala has spent the last several months thinking of names for her soon-to-be-born son and imagining him receiving something she's yet to attain: U.S. citizenship.
But Sigala's hopes for her child became cloudier a little more than a week ago following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision that touched on the issue of birthright citizenship.
The estate of a Northwestern University professor, who died by suicide last year after being investigated in a controversial federal probe, is suing the school for allegedly discriminating against her and evicting her from her lab — blaming the university, in part, for her death.
Racers zoomed around the streets of the Loop under cloudy skies yesterday. A brief shower passed through the area shortly after the race concluded. The weather may have been different for this race but not the outcome.
Shane van Gisbergen of New Zealand swept the Chicago Street Race weekend, winning his fourth of six eligible races.
On a sweltering morning at Wrigley Field, hours before the Chicago Cubs' 8-6 loss to the St. Louis Cardinals, the daily pregame meeting of ushers and security guards was interrupted by a guest speaker who needed no introduction.
Pete Crow-Armstrong ambled up to the mic and held it like he was giving a toast at his best friend's wedding, writes Paul Sullivan.
'I think it was important for us to be Black,' said Jamhal Johnson, co-founder of Chicago's local Moor's Brewing Co. 'We put a Black man on the beer can.'
For Johnson and longtime friends Damon Patton and Anthony Bell, that's been one part of a well-considered growth and branding strategy for Moor's Brewery Co., the Chicago Black-owned brewery the trio co-founded in 2021. Last month, they won the Samuel Adams 2025 Brewing the American Dream competition and will receive a year of financial assistance and mentorship from the brand, a key player in the craft brewing space.
The village of Dolton, which is where you may find yourself if you're traveling south through Chicago and run out of Chicago to travel through, which we have heard more about in the past 30 days or so than since it was established 130-odd years ago, which is now best known to the world as the hometown of Pope Leo XIV, is like a lot of Midwestern places. Or a lot of the blink-and-you-miss-it boondocks, backwaters and wherevers other popes have come from.
You never give it a second thought, until you do.
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Miami Herald
6 minutes ago
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Trump administration lifts terrorist designation from Syrian group
July 7 (UPI) -- The Trump administration announced Monday it will rescind the terrorist designation given to the group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham. In a document from the State Department, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio wrote that the United States has revoked "the designation of al-Nusrah Front, also known as Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, as a foreign terrorist organization." The revocation will go into effect upon its official publication Tuesday, but the letter already has been made available to read by the general public. HTS is currently leading Syria after it led the overthrow of former dictator Bashar Assad. The group's origins come from a Syrian branch of al-Qaeda, but it severed ties several years ago. President Donald Trump directed the State Department last week to review the status of HTS as a terrorist group as part of an executive order that removed several sanctions formerly levied on Syria. "I took off the sanctions because if I didn't do that, they wouldn't have had a chance. And Syria has a chance," Trump said last week during a press conference. Copyright 2025 UPI News Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
CNN
8 minutes ago
- CNN
Analysis: Trump's government cuts and the catastrophe in Texas
President Donald Trump's approach to the federal government has been to cut, cut, cut, which means when there is a disaster in which the government plays a role, he will have to expect questions about those cuts. When there's a plane crash, as there was days into his second term, the shortage of air traffic controllers will be scrutinized. When the administration quietly backtracks on some layoffs and struggles to re-fill key positions, it will lead to concerns that cuts went too far. When there's a tragic flood that catches an area off-guard, the effect of his cuts on the National Weather Service and FEMA will become a line of inquiry. Flash floods killed at least 95 people over the July Fourth holiday, and many others are still missing. Rescue and recovery are still ongoing, so no one can say for sure that personnel cuts at the National Weather Service or open positions at forecasting offices in Texas amplified or even affected the flood's tragic outcome. There are many facts yet to be discovered, and a full investigation will certainly be conducted. Prev Next Recent reports about how staffing and budget cuts are affecting forecasting at the agency may ultimately be seen as an early warning. 'The National Weather Service is in worse shape than previously known, according to interviews with current and former meteorologists, due to a combination of layoffs, early retirements and preexisting vacancies,' CNN's Andrew Freedman wrote back in May. The report also noted that a third of National Weather Service forecasting stations lacked a top meteorologist in charge. CNN reported in April the Trump's administration plans to close weather research laboratories and climate research programs meant to improve weather detection as the climate warms. That budget proposal was more recently submitted to Congress. Project 2025, the conservative government blueprint that presaged many of the Trump administration's decisions, called for much less federal spending on weather forecasting and more reliance on private companies. We also can't say for sure that Trump's hands-off approach to emergency management will affect recovery in Texas. In fact, Trump quickly declared the flood zone to be a major disaster area. But he has also said he wants to shutter the Federal Emergency Management Agency and for the federal government to play a much smaller role. 'We want to wean off of FEMA, and we want to bring it back to the state level,' he said at the White House in June. Asked if Trump is reconsidering that position in light of the horrible Texas floods, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said this: 'The president wants to ensure American citizens always have what they need during times of need. Whether that assistance comes from states or the federal government, that's a policy discussion that will continue. And the president has always said he wants states to do as much as they can, if not more.' CNN's Gabe Cohen recently reported that disaster decisions were being made directly at the White House, bypassing FEMA and the well-trod process by which states seek help. It also raises concerns that White House political allies could get more attention than political enemies, although a Department of Homeland Security spokesman denied that idea to Cohen. Wanting the federal government to do less has been a theme of the Trump administration so far. States will either have to pony up more of their own money for Medicaid and food aid or watch citizens fall off assistance as a result of the sweeping new policy bill he signed Friday. We also can't directly blame this or any one storm on climate change. But Republicans are currently bragging about killing the previous administration's climate agenda, which Trump and his allies call the 'Green New Scam.' In terms of specifics about the Texas floods, local residents and officials, still in shock during TV interviews, said they were caught off-guard by the floods. That may not ultimately be a forecasting issue. 'The weather service did their job,' Rick Spinrad, who was National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration administrator during the Biden administration, told CNN's Boris Sanchez on Monday, referring to the issuance of watches, warnings and 'WEAs,' the Wireless Emergency Alert system. But Spinrad admitted there could have been a breakdown in connectivity between the forecasters and emergency services in the morning. 'On first blush, the communications breakdown happened at that last mile,' he said. The San Antonio National Weather Service office was missing a key coordinator who Spinrad said 'is critical in that last mile of communications.' That position has been vacant since April, when a longtime employee took the Trump administration's buyout offer. Asked about that unfilled position, Leavitt said, 'The offices were fully staffed with forecasters.' Kerrville, Texas, Mayor Joe Herring Jr., told CNN's Pamela Brown on Monday that he lost friends in the floods and that local officials had not gotten word about the severity of the forecast. 'We didn't even have a warning. We did not know,' he said, fighting back tears. CNN's Brown, who reported from Texas, has a personal connection to the story: As a child, she attended Camp Mystic, the girls' camp where the flood claimed the lives of 27, including campers and staffers. 'I do think it's important to have patience and humility that those (answers on what happened) may not come as quickly as perhaps we want,' she said. 'It was a once-in-a-lifetime flood,' she added. Residents knew the river could flood, but people she spoke to are referring to this as 'an act of God.'
Los Angeles Times
8 minutes ago
- Los Angeles Times
Migrants deported from U.S. to Salvadoran prison remain under U.S. control, Salvadoran officials tell U.N.
WASHINGTON — The government of El Salvador has acknowledged to United Nations investigators that the Trump administration maintains control of the Venezuelan men who were deported from the U.S. to a notorious Salvadoran prison, contradicting public statements by officials in both countries. The revelation was contained in court filings Monday by lawyers for more than 100 migrants who are seeking to challenge their deportations to El Salvador's mega-prison known as the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT. The case is among several challenging President Trump's immigration crackdown. 'In this context, the jurisdiction and legal responsibility for these persons lie exclusively with the competent foreign authorities,' Salvadoran officials wrote in response to queries from the unit of the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. The U.N. group has been looking into the fate of the men who were sent to El Salvador from the United States in mid-March, even after a U.S. judge had ordered the planes that were carrying them to be turned around. The Trump administration has argued that it is powerless to return the men, noting that they are beyond the reach of U.S. courts and no longer have access to due process rights or other U.S. constitutional guarantees. But lawyers for the migrants said the U.N. report shows otherwise. 'El Salvador has confirmed what we and everyone else understood: it is the United States that controls what happens to the Venezuelans languishing at CECOT. Remarkably the U.S. government didn't provide this information to us or the court,' American Civil Liberties Union lawyer Lee Gelerent said in an email. Skye Perryman, chief executive and president of Democracy Forward, said the documents show 'that the administration has not been honest with the court or the American people.' The ACLU and Democracy Forward are both representing the migrants. Administration officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The administration in March agreed to pay $6 million for El Salvador to house 300 migrants. The deal sparked immediate controversy when Trump invoked an 18th century wartime law, the Alien Enemies Act, to quickly remove men it has accused of being members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. In a related case, the administration mistakenly sent Kilmar Abrego Garcia to the same prison, despite a judge's order prohibiting the Maryland man from being sent to El Salvador. The administration initially resisted court orders to bring him back to the U.S., saying he was no longer in American custody. Eventually, Abrego Garcia was returned to the U.S., where he now faces criminal charges of human smuggling while legal battles continue. Last month, a coalition of immigrant rights groups sued to invalidate the prison deal with El Salvador, arguing that the arrangement to move migrant detainees outside the reach of U.S. courts violates the Constitution. Sherman writes for the Associated Press.
