Durbin under fire / Bikes under fire / Out at the Sun-Times

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[Republishing this edition to correct an error in the wrongful conviction item below.]

Durbin under fire. NBC News veteran Ben Collins—now CEO of the company that owns The Onion—addresses Illinois’ senior senator on Bluesky: “No one is picking up your Senate phone and you don’t even have a voicemail. Vote no on … the spending bill or I will do whatever it takes to make sure the next senator from Illinois has basic constituent services set up during business hours.”
■ The biggest federal workers’ union: Better for the government to shut down than for Trump’s spending bill to pass.

‘Don’t let anybody tell you that yelling and making a fuss doesn’t matter, or that journalism doesn’t matter.’ MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow celebrated Connecticut Rep. John Larson’s fiery rant about the Trump administration’s threat to Social Security …
■ ProPublica has audio in which Trump’s acting Social Security commissioner acknowledges that the agency is in a far more precarious place than has been widely understood.
■ Dan Froomkin at Press Watch: “Press coverage of Trump’s tariffs understates the insanity. One CNBC analyst has spoken the truth. Will other journalists follow?”

‘If this man is not released, any American protester, activist or truly any citizen who the administration chooses to jail, will be.’ Former Illinois Rep. Marie Newman is encouraging people to sign a petition demanding the release of Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil.
■ He’s finally been allowed to talk to attorneys.
■ A former Columbia student journalist now at Politico: “Here is what we do know—about Khalil, student protesters and the vibe at Columbia.”

‘Clogged sinks, overflowing trash cans and a lack of toilet paper.’ The American Prospect: As federal workers comply with Trump’s “return to office” edict, they’re finding custodial staffing not up to the job.

Score one for science? Politico: Trump’s withdrawing his nomination of an anti-vaccine former Florida representative to head the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
■ But, Popular Information says: “As measles cases soar, RFK Jr. declares war on science.”

Guantanamo plans at bay. Trump’s plan to hold migrants in Cuba is a flop: The administration’s reportedly moved them all back to the U.S. …
■ … but now his Homeland Security department’s investigating U.S. organizations that give migrants housing and other aid—on grounds such programs violate laws against human smuggling.
■ The American Prospect: In cutting funding for fair housing organizations, Trump’s weakening protection against discrimination.
■ Politico’s Shia Kapos: “Immigrants transformed Chicago’s South Side. Trump’s crackdown is pushing them underground.”

Bikes under fire. StreetsBlog: Trump’s Transportation Department has ordered a review of all federal grants related to bicycling and green infrastructure.
■ As vehicles become more fuel-efficient, Illinois is considering taxing drivers by the mile instead of the gallon.
■ Declaring the “most consequential day of deregulation in U.S. history,” the federal Environmental Protection Agency has drawn a target on more than two dozen rules and policies governing, among others, vehicle and industrial air pollution, power plants and wastewater.
■ The City Council’s rejected a proposal to ban fur sales in Chicago.

New Chicago record. The City Council’s A federal jury has approved $120 million for two men wrongfully convicted of a 2003 murder.
■ Columnist Eric Zorn: “Way too much! … Think of the schools, mental health clinics and food programs that $120 million could fund.”

Trump’s creepy question. CNN’s Brian Stelter says the president’s increasingly asking reporters at his news conferences: “Who are you with?”
■ Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s been hanging around the White House.
■ Also from Stelter: Facebook parent Meta’s new “community notes” program to flag fact-checked posts “means Meta will no longer try to reduce the reach of a lie, no matter how shameful or harmful.”
■ Ars Technica: Trump’s Justice Department wants Google to sell off the Chrome browser—and the Android platform could be next.

‘I’ve bought myself a Tesla
(That’s my buddy Elon’s car)
It’s very, very manly
Just like me and Elon are!’
That’s the start of Pulitzer-winning columnist Mary Schmich’s latest TrumPoem.
■ Block Club: Chicagoans hoping to ditch their Teslas in protest are finding “nobody wants to buy them.”
■ Columnist and cartoonist Jack Ohman: “It’s only 45 days into his second term and Trump is tearing down the economy.” (Cartoon: Ohman.)
■ Folksinger Joan Baez on the season debut of John Mullaney’s live Netflix talk show: “We’re being run by a bunch of really incompetent billionaires.”

Reminder: Your gadgets aren’t really under your control. Google’s beloved but discontinued Chromecast audio devices—one of which has provided a daily soundtrack for Chicago Public Square’s production—have suddenly crapped out.
■ Nixplay—whose digital picture frames adorn many a proud grandparent’s side table—says some services that have been free will cost $25 a year.

Out at the Sun-Times. Eric Zorn updates the list of staffers taking buyouts.
■ Columnist Neil Steinberg: “While I’ve decided not to take the buy-out—I think, having until Sunday at 5 p.m. to change my mind—I’m not 100% confident I won’t be canned anyway.”
■ Columnist Ruth Marcus takes to the pages of The New Yorker to explain why, after 40 years, she quit The Washington Post: “My job is supposed to be to tell you what I think, not what Jeff Bezos thinks I should think.”
■ Semafor: After first discouraging one of its most visible gay employees from attending an LGBTQ Pride event, National Public Radio’s backed down.

Thanks. Your financial support—even just $1, once—keeps Square free for all. And it brings you bonus perks, too.
■ Bruce Pfaff made this edition better.

‘Terrified’ / R.I.P., ‘environmental justice’ / COVIDiversary

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Miss Chicago Public Square over the last week-and-a-half? You must not have been following the Square Bluesky account, where more than 225 links to breaking news and commentary have appeared since this newsletter’s last regular edition Feb. 28.
■ But, hey, we’re back just in time for the eighth(!) annual National Support Chicago Public Square Day. (Details below.)

‘Terrified.’ That’s what a Justice Department lawyer fired last week—apparently for opposing the restoration of gun rights to actor and Donald Trump friend Mel Gibson after his 2011 domestic violence conviction—says Americans should be over the department’s current leadership.
■ She told MSNBC’s Chris Hayes last night: “What’s going on … in terms of silencing dissent, is so frightening that I felt like I needed to share this story.”
■ 404 Media: “A contractor for … U.S. government agencies has developed a tool that lets analysts more easily pull a target individual’s publicly available data from a wide array of sites, social networks, apps and services across the web at once, including Bluesky, OnlyFans, and various Meta platforms … allowing them to map out a person’s activity, movements, and relationships.”
■ Chicago cops yesterday arrested 11 workers and supporters staging a sit-in at one of the city’s unionized Starbucks shops.

Lesson in layoffs. The U.S. Education Department plans to cut more than half its staff—axing its leases on buildings in Chicago and other cities.
■ That reportedly includes all Chicago employees.
■ ChalkBeat: Affected staffers would be placed on leave March 21, but were told to leave their offices by 6 p.m. yesterday.
■ WBEZ: “Most of the funding for Illinois schools comes from state and local sources,” but “federal funding makes up about 16% ($1.3 billion) of the $8.4 billion Chicago Public Schools operating budget.”
■ Gov. Pritzker laid into Trump: “Instead of proposing any plans to improve math and reading scores for students, he’s … making it harder for working-class kids to get ahead.”
■ The AP: “The Education Department was created to ensure equal access. Who would do that in its absence?”
■ A new report finds Illinois’ teacher shortage is easing …
■ … although the Chicago Teachers Union says the city’s evaluation system disproportionately targets black teachers.

‘Attacks on education, like attacks on free speech and tolerance, are attacks on Jews.’ Columnist Neil Steinberg rips into the Trump administration’s withholding of $400 million in funding from Columbia University—allegedly because it’s not doing enough to fight antisemitism.
■ At least two Illinois universities have gotten Education Department warnings that they face penalties if they don’t crack down on pro-Palestinian campus protests.
■ Law professor Joyce Vance: “Columbia grad student Mahmoud Khalil’s detention means we are just a hop, skip and jump away from political persecutions.”

R.I.P., ‘environmental justice.’ Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency plans to close all its offices dedicated to addressing pollution in poor and minority communities (New York Times gift link) …
■ A new global report for 2024 ranks Chicago the nation’s seventh most-polluted major city—but that’s down from No. 2 the year before. (Gift Tribune link, courtesy of Chicago Public Square supporters.)

DOGE Tracker. Popular Information’s Musk Watch has launched a tool to “cut through the spin” about Elon Musk’s purported savings …
■ … and it finds his “Department of Government Efficiency” has overstated its claims by 92%.
■ Wired: “Musk has wanted a government shutdown in part because it would potentially make it easier to eliminate the jobs of hundreds of thousands of federal workers.”
■ As Congress wrestles with a resolution to avert a shutdown, columnist James Fallows calls on Democrats: “Do not vote Yes on it. Make the GOP own a government shutdown instead—rather than allowing them to dismantle the government.”
■ CNN: “As the Office of Personnel Management oversaw the layoffs of thousands of federal workers and pressed others to justify their positions, the agency’s chief spokesperson repeatedly used her office for a side hustle: Aspiring Instagram fashion influencer.”
■ Stephen Colbert on the plunge in value for Musk’s Tesla stock: “It’s a phenomenon called ‘Everybody f*cking hates that guy.’”
■ Musk reportedly plans to dump $100 million on Trump-allied groups in the days ahead.

‘He currently holds no office and hasn’t been on a ballot for a decade.’ But Politico says former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is “road-testing” a run for the presidency …
■ … which makes this an apt time to revisit your Square columnist’s intense year covering Emanuel almost daily.
■ The American Prospect: Right-wing donors and foundations spent $1 billion to keep people from voting last year.

‘I’m mayor of the city of Chicago because of young people.’ And so Mayor Johnson says he opposes a curfew for unaccompanied minors downtown …
■ … even though the head of the city’s public safety committee attributes the shooting of a 46-year-old tourist walking with her son in Streeterville Sunday night to large teen gatherings downtown.

‘An affront to the Constitution and our adversarial system of justice.’ Big Law firm Perkins Coie is suing the Trump administration over an executive order targeting the firm for—among other things—representing Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign.
■ Lawyer George Conway—ex-husband to Trump thrall shill Kellyanne Conway—salutes the firm representing Perkins for putting “*14* individual lawyers’ names in the signature block of their complaint … sending a clear message: We are not afraid.”

This means (trade) war. In response to Trump’s imposition of tariffs on foreign goods, Canada was set to announce its own fees on U.S. stuff …
■ … and the European Union’s targeting American beef, whiskey and motorcycles.
■ But Trump himself is doing OK: Jeff Bezos’ Amazon is sending cash his way by putting all seven seasons of The Apprentice on Prime.
■ Humorist Andy Borowitz: “Trump Starts Selling Trump Eggs for $60 an Egg.”

COVIDiversary. Chicago Public Square on this date in 2020: Tom Hanks and his wife tested positive for COVID-19, Congress closed to the public, the NBA suspended the rest of its season, late-night TV shows gave up live audiences, Chicago canceled its St. Patrick Day parades.
■ The Atlantic’s Roxanne Khamsi looks back to writing a March 2020 article that “risked ruining my journalistic reputation”—about “the possibility that the new coronavirus could travel easily from person to person through the air.”
■ Johns Hopkins University—the nation’s top spender on health research and development—is planning big layoffs and program eliminations after the Trump administration’s cancellation of $800 million in grants. (Wall Street Journal gift link.)
■ Wired: “This is how measles kills.”

‘The sad day Southwest Airlines became like every other airline.’ A Tribune editorial calls the end of its bags-fly-free policy “the nail in the coffin of all that made Southwest special.”
■ Need one of those new Real ID cards quick? The state’s opened a downtown “supercenter” to expedite the process.

‘AI chatbots keep failing every accuracy test thrown at them.’ Media watcher Simon Owens counsels caution—for news reporters and news consumers.
■ Columbia Journalism Review: “We compared eight AI search engines. They’re all bad at citing news.”

It’s National Support Chicago Public Square Day. Welcome to the eighth annual observance of this august—um, March—event. This publication is free for all, but it’s not free to publish. Readers keep it coming …

Thanks. Mark Wukas made this edition better.

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