Good morning, Chicago. ✶
🔎 Below: Tear gas, car crashes, rubber bullets — we look into federal immigration agents’ tactics over the last three months and a possible surge in enforcement next spring.
🗞️ Plus: The pressure on food pantries, a tour inside the Obama Presidential Center and more news you need to know.
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⏱️: An 8-minute read
TODAY’S WEATHER ☀️
Sunny with a high near 65.
TODAY’S TOP STORIES 🗞️
Risky tactics have driven Trump’s Chicago deportation ‘blitz’
By Chip Mitchell, Tom Schuba, Sophie Sherry, Alden Loury, Frank Main and Jon Seidel
3-month recap: Over the past three months, federal immigration agents wearing masks and military-style garb have crisscrossed the Chicago area, from the Far South Side to the north suburbs.
Feds’ tactics: They’ve arrested people without legal status and occasionally U.S. citizens as well. Two people have been shot, one fatally. Rubber pellets and pepper balls have been fired into crowds. Neighborhoods have been enveloped in clouds of noxious gas from canisters, tossed by federal agents, that have sickened residents and police officers. Agents have used chokeholds in at least five incidents.
We investigate: Agents have been involved in eight car chases and used force in at least 76 incidents, according to an analysis by WBEZ and the Sun-Times based on a review of hundreds of court documents, videos and news reports. The examination focused on 18 types of force and also vehicle chases and collisions from Sept. 8 through Nov. 10 in the Chicago area, including northwest Indiana.
Trial planned: The judge who handed down a sweeping order restricting the feds’ use of force during their deportation campaign in Chicago is planning a March 2 trial that could lead to a more permanent ruling ahead of a possible surge of agents in the spring.
More headlines:
- Border Patrol boss Gregory Bovino and many of his agents favor Trump, GOP in their campaign giving
- City leaders push back after DHS takes credit in Chicago’s crime drop
- Day care teacher is freed after judge rules her immigration arrest ‘unlawful’
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Food pantries face ‘unprecedented’ need ahead of holiday season
By Mariah Rush, Elvia Malagón and Casey He
Pantry pressure: Chicago’s food pantries have struggled due to federal and state funding cuts earlier this year. President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement in Chicago also has caused pantries to see an influx of people. The squeeze of financial and economic pressures on pantries has created extra anxiety ahead of the holiday season.
Food factors: Many people have been staying off the streets and missing work out of fear of running into federal immigration agents. There was also recent turmoil for recipients of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program aid because of the federal government shutdown.
Where SNAP stands: Illinois officials say they expect full SNAP food assistance to begin flowing Friday and that nearly 2 million people in the state who rely on the program to buy groceries will receive full benefits by Nov. 20.
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Obama Presidential Center takes shape after 10 years of delays and construction
By Lee Bey
Long time coming: The Obama Presidential Center has spent a decade on the drawing board and under construction — two years longer than its namesake’s time in the White House. But now the team of workers, erectors, fabricators and artisans is months away from completing the $800 million center that’s expected to open next spring.
Inside the space: Sun-Times architecture columnist Lee Bey toured the site with one of its two lead architects, Billie Tsien of New York-based Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects.
A solid look: Enough work has been completed to get a solid look at what will be the most expensive presidential center in U.S. history, and to get a sense of what the public will get after giving up 20 acres of historic Jackson Park for a campus of new buildings, gardens and a 225-foot museum tower.
WATCH: TOUR THE OBAMA CENTER ▶️
Sun-Times architecture columnist Lee Bey goes inside the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park. | Candace Dane Chambers/Sun-Times
MORE NEWS YOU NEED ✶
- Starbucks strikes: More than 1,000 unionized Starbucks workers went on strike Thursday at 65 U.S. stores, including in Evanston and Geneva, to protest a lack of progress in labor negotiations.
- Puncher faces new charges: A man with a history of allegedly slugging women is facing new charges after an unprovoked attack in June in Lincoln Park, police said.
- Lil Durk wants case tossed: Lawyers for the rapper, born Durk Banks, called for the dismissal of his murder-for-hire case in Los Angeles after learning that a judge and a prosecutor received death threats that weren’t disclosed to Banks’ legal team for seven months.
- Metra, Pace OK budgets: Metra’s leaders approved a $1.2 billion budget that spares riders from a fare hike next year but keeps the status quo with plans for minor enhancements.
- Chuy chewed out: U.S. Rep. Jesus “Chuy” Garcia was publicly criticized on the House floor Wednesday by a Washington state Democrat who wants lawmakers to adopt a resolution claiming the Chicago Democrat undermined “the process of a free and fair election” by helping his chief of staff take his place on the ballot.
- Pipe replacement push: A group of Illinois congressional delegates is calling for the release of $3 billion in withheld federal funding that’s meant to help replace toxic lead service lines that supply drinking water to homes across the country.
- Dirty work?: Homeaglow’s $19 house cleaning service traps customers in hard-to-cancel subscriptions, according to a nonprofit watchdog group.
LET’S HEAR FROM YOU 🗣️
Is your Obamacare health insurance getting more expensive? Tell us about it.
As we continue reporting on the Affordable Care Act, we want to know about what kind of hikes you are seeing as you sign up for health insurance. Take this survey to share your experience with us.
WEEKEND PLANS 🎉
List by Mary Houlihan
🎭 “A Christmas Carol”
Friday through Dec. 31
📍Goodman Theatre, 170 N. Dearborn St.
Holiday theater gets underway with the Goodman Theatre’s 48th staging of “A Christmas Carol,” starring Christopher Donahue.
Admission: $34+
💃 Hubbard Street Dance Chicago
Friday through Nov. 23
📍835 Michigan Ave., fourth floor
The company’s 48th season kicks off with Ohad Naharin’s “Black Milk” and Bob Fosse’s “Percussion IV.”
Admission: $30+
🪩 Frankie Knuckles Festival
12-8 p.m. Saturday
📍The Land School, 1353 E 72nd St.
Rebuild Foundation, the custodian of the Frankie Knuckles Collection, hosts this fourth annual festival, which features a stacked lineup of local DJs.
Admission: Donation
🎅 Fa La La Fabulous Holiday Market
11 a.m.-6 p.m. Saturday
📍Center on Halsted, 3656 N. Halsted St., third floor gym
Get a head start on holiday shopping with wares from more than 40 artists from the LGBTQIA+ and ally community.
Admission $5 suggested donation
🛍️ Randolph Street Holiday Market
10 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday
📍Plumbers Hall, 1340 W. Washington Blvd.
Shop from more than 125 vendors with selling vintage décor, fashion, estate jewelry, retro furnishings and handmade gifts.
Admission: $12
FROM THE PRESS BOX 🏈🏒🏀
- Gardner-Johnson’s place: The Bears’ DB C.J. Gardner-Johnson is reasserting himself as a playmaker and could get an extended opportunity even after Kyler Gordon returns.
- Hawks’ choice: The Blackhawks might have to decide between re-signing Jason Dickinson or Ilya Mikheyev.
- Terry’s time: The Bulls’ Dalen Terry is taking a big-picture approach to his shrinking minutes.
- Boys basketball: Will Lincoln Williams and EJ Hazelett lead Kankakee to state for the first time in 133 seasons?
GAMES AND CROSSWORDS 🧩
This week’s Chicago-style crossword theme is: Chicago food 🌭
Can you solve this clue?
32A: Chicago “Bar-B-Q” restaurant so famous it had its own Wikipedia page
BRIGHT ONE 🔆
Mavis Staples provides solace for our ‘Sad and Beautiful World’ in new album
By Selena Fragassi
In tracing the journey of modern music, there is one key takeaway: All roads lead to Mavis Staples.
Her legendary eight-decade career would prove as much. It has taken us through South Side Chicago churches to the Jim Crow South, across the Freedom Highway over to the Newport Folk Festival and back to Chicago for her second act.
This feeling remains undeniable when listening to Staples’ latest album, “Sad and Beautiful World,” which all but solidifies her role as a musical and cultural north star.
The collection of 10 songs, released last Friday, pulls from 70 years of a great musical songbook, nearly as long as the 86-year-old has been performing — exposing the lyrical poetry of Tom Waits, Curtis Mayfield, Leonard Cohen, Frank Ocean and Kevin Morby in a new dimension with Staples’ careful delivery.
In addition to blessings from songwriters, the album also features a who’s who of guest instrumentalists who also rightfully bow at Staples’ altar, including Iron & Wine’s Sam Beam, Nathaniel Rateliff, MJ Lenderman, Derek Trucks, Kara Jackson, Waxahatchee’s Katie Crutchfield, Black Pumas’ Eric Burton, Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon, and old friends Bonnie Raitt and Buddy Guy.
Guy’s appearance on the album opener “Chicago” is a moving portrait — the cover of Tom Waits’ original captures the aching hope of the Great Migration that brought both the legendary guitarist and the Staples family north. The calling to lead with music has taken both artists into their 80s.
YOUR DAILY QUESTION ☕️
Which of Chicago’s expressways needs improvements the most? Tell us why. 🚗
Email us (please include your first and last name). We may run your answers in Monday’s Morning Edition newsletter.
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Written and curated by: Matt Moore
Editor: Eydie Cubarrubia
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