Good morning, Chicago. ✶
🔎 Below: A political action committee whose leaders include property manager Corey Oliver gave campaign cash to more than a dozen members of City Council this year, including Ald. Greg Mitchell, whose 7th Ward includes the South Shore building raided by federal agents Sept. 30.
🗞️ Plus: Federal agents continue to tear-gas neighborhoods, mourning mothers pen songs for their slain loved ones and more news you need to know.
📝 Keeping score: The Bears lost to the Ravens, 30-16; the Blackhawks fell to the Kings, 3-1; and the Fire lost on penalty kicks in Game 1 of their playoff series against the Union.
🧩 After you’re caught up: We’ve got a new Chicago-style crossword for you to try. This week’s theme — Halloween.
📧 Subscribe: Get this newsletter delivered to your inbox weekday mornings.
⏱️: A 9-minute read
TODAY’S WEATHER ☀️
Sunny with a high near 55.
TODAY’S TOP STORIES
Woman’s son was fatally shot — and now his memory lives on in song
By Courtney Kueppers
Honoring loved ones: Eight grieving mothers are participating in a program called Notes for Peace that pairs them with musicians from the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s training program. The parents all have lost a loved one to gun violence, and together with young musicians, they write a song in honor of their late children. The whirlwind process unfolds over two weeks, culminating in a live performance and a professionally mixed track.
Justin’s song: WBEZ recently joined Racquel Perry as she recorded a song in honor of her son Justin, killed in a 2021 shooting in Harvey at age 28. “Dear Justin, I just had to get this out to you,” Perry began, speaking the words over an instrumental track. After recording, Perry broke down in tears, hugging one of the songwriting coaches. “He would be so proud,” Perry said.
Listen up 🎧: Listen to Perry record the song for her son here.
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Council members got campaign cash from PAC tied to landlord of building hit in immigration raid
By Robert Herguth and Sophie Sherry
Campaign cash: The property manager of a troubled South Shore apartment building raided last month by immigration agents helps run a political fund that made campaign contributions to more than a dozen members of the City Council this year. The political action committee’s leaders include Corey Oliver of Strength in Management LLC, which oversees the South Shore complex.
The receipts: Recipients include former 27th Ward Ald. Walter Burnett, Mayor Brandon Johnson’s choice to run the Chicago Housing Authority. One of Burnett’s campaign funds accepted a $500 contribution this year from the Neighborhood Building Owners Alliance PAC. Elections records show other 2025 contributions included $1,500 to 11th Ward Ald. Nicole Lee, $1,000 to 42nd Ward Ald. Brendan Reilly — and more.
More headlines:
- Father of daughter battling cancer is being held illegally and deserves chance at release, judge rules
- House Democrats highlight impact of Trump’s Chicago deportations during emotional ‘shadow hearing’
- Brighton Park businesses sign onto city’s ‘ICE-free zones’ initiative
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Federal judge orders Border Patrol commander Gregory Bovino into her courtroom
By Jon Seidel
Tuesday hearing: In a terse, two-sentence order Friday, U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis ordered the public face of President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement campaign, Gregory Bovino, into her courtroom at the Dirksen Federal Courthouse downtown. Ellis set a status hearing in an ongoing lawsuit for Tuesday morning.
Key context: Ellis is presiding over the suit about the feds’ treatment of protesters amid the immigration blitz. The lawsuit was brought by media organizations including the Chicago Headline Club, Block Club Chicago and the Chicago Newspaper Guild. The case has already led to orders forbidding agents from using gas and other “riot control” weapons without two warnings or against people who pose no immediate threat.
More headlines:
- Northwest Side residents confront ICE agents making arrests, firing tear gas
- Feds make arrests across North and Near West sides, deploy tear gas in Lake View
- Dozens march through Little Village at anti-ICE protest
WATCH: FEDS TEAR GAS NEIGHBORHOODS ▶️
MORE NEWS YOU NEED
- Disaster assistance denied: U.S. Sens. Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth urged President Trump to stop playing “political games” with disaster assistance after the president denied disaster funding for Illinois.
- Priest misconduct claims: A woman has accused the Rev. Nestor Sanchez of making aggressive and unwanted sexual advances that she believes amounted to assault while she was employed by a Chicago-area Catholic parish, according to a lawsuit filed in Will County Circuit Court.
- Trump ballroom donors: Konstantin Sokolov, head of the Chicago-based private equity firm IJS Investments, is among 37 donors helping to fund the construction of a 90,000-square-foot ballroom at the White House.
- Fire inspection failures: Over a 12-month period, the Chicago Fire Department’s Fire Prevention Bureau is inspecting just 17% of the buildings in its database for fire code violations and failing to maintain an accurate building inventory, according to the city’s inspector general.
- Comment controversy: Speaking at a Maywood-Melrose Park-Broadview Elementary District 89 school board meeting Oct. 16, concrete contractor Michael D’Addosio made jaws drop when he accused school board vice president Sandra Ciancio of pressuring him for kickbacks in exchange for taxpayer-funded work and insider bid information.
- New public restroom: A free, standalone, self-cleaning public restroom will be installed in Chicago next year, according to Ald. Daniel La Spata (1st). When it’s up and running, it’ll be the first of its kind for the city, matching those that have long been a fixture on European streets.
- Spike Lee honored: The renowned director accepted the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Chicago International Film Festival on Friday.
CHICAGO HISTORY ⏳
Erie Canal, the ditch that made Chicago great, marks its 200th birthday
By Neil Steinberg
Know your history: The most important thing to ever happen in the history of Chicago isn’t well known here because it didn’t happen here, but 500 miles east in New York, exactly 200 years ago Sunday: The opening of the Erie Canal, a 363-mile waterway from Albany, on the Hudson River, west to Buffalo on the northeast tip of Lake Erie.
Open with a bang: The opening was announced by a cannon firing in Buffalo at 9 a.m. Oct. 26, 1825, with the news echoed across the state by guns placed within earshot of each other. As that cannonade reverberated, Chicago was a swampy nowhere, a log stockade fort and, maybe, 100 residents. St. Louis, “the Rome of the West,” had 100 times the population.
Path to present: So how did the Erie Canal push Chicago to the forefront? Dive in here or via the button below.👇
FROM THE PRESS BOX 🏈🏀⚾
- Intercepted talks: Bears Coach Ben Johnson and QB Caleb Williams disputed details of Sunday’s interception as Williams’ struggles continue.
- Classic point guard: The Bulls’ Tre Jones is welcoming the throwback label.
- White Sox reflections: On the White Sox’ 20th anniversary of World Series glory, they’re as deep in the Cubs’ shadow as ever, writes Steve Greenberg.
- High school football: Lincoln-Way East tumbles and Glenbrook South returns to Michael O’Brien’s Super 25 rankings for Week 10.
GAMES AND CROSSWORDS 🧩
This week’s Chicago-style crossword theme is: Halloween 🎃
Here’s your clue:
9A: ___-or-Treat (Trick-or-Treat alternative)
SPOOKY ONE 👻
‘Paranormal Activity’ gives theatergoers a good scare
By Mike Davis
On the stage of Chicago Shakespeare Theater right now sits a two-story, life-size doll house, looming under dimmed lights and veiled by an ominous haze pumped in from offstage. The set, designed by Fly Davis, creepily beckons audiences at the Navy Pier theater.
“Paranormal Activity” is the new stage play written by Chicago’s Levi Holloway, having made its North American premiere at Chicago Shakespeare earlier this month. The play is based on the award-winning film series of the same name, known for its found footage — an effect producers have recreated to an extent, along with giving the story a new look and feel.
To create this new installment to the well-known franchise, Holloway teamed up with Felix Barrett, artistic director of Punchdrunk, an innovative theater company in the United Kingdom.
The minds behind the play aimed to reach beyond the realistic house set onstage and engage audience members with frights that feel real.
The movies found ways to be scary without the use of actual ghouls, ghosts or monsters. Barrett says the show leans into a similar style. “There’s a sort of strange poetry and magic to the things you don’t quite see,” he said.
In a four-star review for the Sun-Times, critic Steven Oxman wrote: “Here we have a terrific, majority Chicago cast who move skillfully and so darn believably, between moments of relaxation and turn-it-up-to-11 intensity.”
“Paranormal Activity” runs through Sunday, with tickets from $62.
YOUR DAILY QUESTION ☕️
What’s a Chicago ghost story or urban legend that you grew up hearing?
Email us (please include your first and last name). We may run your answers in Tuesday’s Morning Edition newsletter.
On Friday, we asked you: What is your tried and true remedy when you have a cold?
Here’s some of what you said…
“About 10 Cuties at a time and blue Gatorade and sleep.” — Alejandra Sanchez
“A hot toddy made with tequila, lemon and honey in hot water.”— Angela Cantu
“Hot cup of water with lime juice squeezed into it with the lime peel with a little Splenda, let it sit for about ten minutes, then drink. I actually drink this every day and I haven’t a cold or even been sick in years.”— Essie Owens Pritchard
“As soon as I do feel a cold coming on, I take 7 of the 1000mg vitamin C tablets for 3 days and it will always go away. I have done this for over 30 years.”— Linda Padgurskis
“Johnny Walker Red, boiling hot water, honey, slice of lemon studded with cloves, and cinnamon stick.”— Eve Gibson Pytel
Thanks for reading the Sun-Times Morning Edition!
Got a story you think we missed? Email us here.
Written and curated by: Matt Moore
Editor: Eydie Cubarrubia
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