Good afternoon! Can’t get sufficient of da pope? My colleagues are promoting commemorative merch of at the moment’s Chicago Solar-Instances entrance web page. Right here’s what else it’s good to know at the moment.
1. Two years in, Mayor Brandon Johnson admits he has made some missteps and gaffes
As Johnson approaches the midpoint of his time period, he appears to know he has dug himself right into a political gap partly by failing to speak, my colleagues Mariah Woelfel and Fran Spielman write.
“In case you don’t get out in entrance and guarantee that your message is obvious, your opposition definitely will. And that’s precisely what occurred,” Johnson mentioned in an prolonged interview with WBEZ and the Chicago Solar-Instances.
The college board debacle. Johnson’s failure to wash home instantly and the personnel missteps that adopted. His obvious falling-out with a progressive union that was a bedrock of his assist. Continued tensions with Gov. JB Pritzker, an anemic report in Springfield. An ongoing contract dispute with Chicago firefighters. The protracted funds stalemate and a damaged promise to carry the road on property taxes. Tensions with an emboldened Metropolis Council.
All of it and extra begs the query: Is Johnson a one-term mayor with competency questions which might be irreversible with Chicago voters? Or does he have a pathway out — and if he does, what’s his uphill street to reelection?
“It’s by no means too late,” Johnson mentioned. [WBEZ/Chicago Sun-Times]
2. St. Rita Excessive Faculty cheers for Pope Leo XIV
Whereas Robert Francis Prevost didn’t attend St. Rita of Cascia Excessive Faculty in Ashburn, his connection to the varsity runs deep, my colleague Kaitlin Washburn studies for the Chicago Solar-Instances.
The college follows the philosophy of the Augustinians, the brand new pope’s spiritual order. Within the Nineteen Eighties, he was a substitute and summer-school trainer there for math and physics. He’s stayed near the employees through the years and has visited the varsity a number of instances, mentioned the Rev. Tom McCarthy, St. Rita’s chapel director.
“He’s one in all us, an Augustinian, and the youngsters are so proud,” McCarthy mentioned. “I emailed Cardinal Prevost on Tuesday and simply mentioned, ‘We’re praying for you, Bob, and all of the cardinals. Come, Holy Spirit.’ And he simply mentioned, ‘Thanks Tom. Please pray.’ ” [Chicago Sun-Times]
On the Catholic Theological Union within the Hyde Park neighborhood, the place the brand new pope graduated with a grasp’s of divinity diploma in 1982, employees and college students additionally celebrated.
“It’s unreal,” mentioned Miguel Antonio Moreno, an Augustinian friar and present pupil on the faculty. “We’re unified, having one in all ours go as much as the highest. It brings us all collectively.” [Chicago Sun-Times]
3. The CPS Board president ripped into the district’s outgoing CEO and budget-cutting proposals
The president of the Chicago Board of Training is tearing into the varsity district’s embattled CEO, saying that the funds proposals he produced for subsequent faculty 12 months are “unsatisfactory and incomplete” — and that Pedro Martinez’s deliberate June exit from the varsity district must be accelerated.
As my colleague Sarah Karp studies for WBEZ, the cruel phrases come because the board grapples with its first funds and a deficit of at the least $500 million. The college district’s fiscal 12 months ends on June 30 and the funds course of is means not on time.
Board President Sean Harden and different members say they’re upset Martinez and his employees gave them choices that embody employees layoffs however “no actual options” for balancing the funds with out cuts. [WBEZ]
In the meantime, Mayor Brandon Johnson faces criticism for attempting to push his chief of employees into the interim CEO function after Martinez leaves. [WBEZ]
Noem kicked off her Springfield go to Wednesday with a photograph op at a federal facility as brokers fingerprinted two Guatemalan males marked for deportation. Her company didn’t clarify what public menace they posed as she blasted Illinois’ sanctuary insurance policies, my colleagues Chip Mitchell and George Wiebe report.
Each labored in Mexican eating places and lived with their wives and youngsters within the Edgewood Cell Residence Park, based on a neighbor and a public well being volunteer who acknowledged the detainees in a information photograph. The park, consisting of about 40 trailers, is three miles southwest of the state capitol constructing.
Each households migrated to america from Guatemala years in the past, based on the volunteer, Julio Barrenzuela, a U.S. Navy veteran who turned one of many park’s trailers right into a makeshift clinic and training middle throughout the COVID pandemic. ICE arrested the lads Wednesday morning on the trailer park, Barrenzuela mentioned. [WBEZ/Chicago Sun-Times]
5. A pupil pageant at a Little Village highschool will have fun artwork, tradition and group
Little Village Lawndale Excessive Faculty was constructed after a extremely publicized 19-day starvation strike that started on Mom’s Day 2001, when dad and mom and group leaders pushed for Chicago Public Faculties to observe by means of on their promise to construct a highschool of their neighborhood. The college was constructed 4 years later in Little Village, serving college students and their households from the neighboring South and North Lawndale neighborhoods.
Alister Ramírez and Arturo Anguiano III, each 17-year-old juniors, are among the many dozens of scholars who can be displaying and promoting their paintings tomorrow on the Multicultural Arts Faculty’s MASterpiece Artwork Pageant. The occasion can be adopted by a twentieth anniversary celebration of Little Village Lawndale Excessive Faculty.
Amongst Anguiano’s work on show is what he dubs a “mega poster,” made up of 9 particular person posters. Some have been left uncolored to symbolize his breakthrough with a latest bout of artist’s block. Anguiano invited different college students to paint within the pages, he mentioned.
“It took a complete of 11 days of labor time to finish that drawing,” he mentioned. “As a younger artist, I need to encourage different younger artists to maintain progressing in their very own artwork.” [Chicago Sun-Times]
Right here’s what else is occurring
- President Donald Trump floated reducing tariffs on China from 145% to 80% forward of a weekend assembly amongst prime U.S. and Chinese language commerce officers. [AP]
- Air visitors controllers once more misplaced radar and radio contact with planes approaching and departing Newark Liberty Worldwide Airport. [CNN]
- David Steiner of FedEx was tapped to be the U.S. Postal Service’s new chief. [NPR]
- A 50-year-old Soviet spacecraft is predicted to crash on Earth this weekend. [NPR]
Oh, and yet one more factor …
With out cleaning soap operas, we wouldn’t have melodramas or actuality reveals. With out soaps, we wouldn’t have lots of the TV tropes and reveals we like to stream and binge-watch. Cliffhangers, serials, vixens — in tv storytelling, all come from soaps.
Community tv wouldn’t exist if not for the monetary success of cleaning soap operas, based on Elana Levine, creator of Her Tales: Daytime Cleaning soap Opera and US Tv Historical past. Throughout the Seventies, Levine mentioned soaps introduced in 75% of the networks’ income.
“Soaps had been a professional form of popular culture sensation. Consequently, the networks are in a position to cost extra for these advert slots,” she mentioned. “It’s a technique to attain younger folks specifically for a time. [Networks] had been prepared to pay extra, as a result of what they had been paying was nonetheless an entire lot lower than what primetime TV price them, when it comes to promoting time.” [WBEZ]
Inform me one thing good …
Thanks for the responses this week about one of the best belongings you’ve executed on your mothers on Mom’s Day! It was nice listening to your tales, and I hope you all have an incredible weekend.
