500 journalists / Trump blames Canada / ‘ICE is lying’

500 journalists. As the White House Correspondents’ Association do-over of its dinner with Donald Trump approaches Friday, a coalition of news organizations and veteran reporters—including your Chicago Public Square columnist—are repeating their plea from the first time: Confront the president over his attacks on the First Amendment.

■ Poynter’s Tom Jones: “Just when it seemed the Trump administration couldn’t be any more brazen in its attacks on the media, it went even further” …

■ … in its hunt for leaks about Trump’s deficient Qatari-gifted Air Force One jet, seeking phone records of New York Times reporters’ relatives.

■ But Talking Points Memo says that, conceding major screwups, the Justice Department’s paused those Times subpoenas.

■ Wired: The ACLU’s releasing an online toolkit this week to help defense attorneys learn whether law enforcement secretly used surveillance technologies—such as facial recognition, automatic license plate readers and gunshot detection systems—to build cases against their clients.

Grim milestone. Cook County’s tally so far of heat-related deaths for July makes this the worst such month in more than a decade.

■ Your Local Epidemiologist: “COVID-19 is quietly waking up … just as it does every summer around mid-July.”

■ The American Prospect: The end of Temporary Protected Status is aggravating a shortage of care workers, as too few of those left in the country “are willing to work for low pay in nursing homes, hospice care, home care and as personal care attendants for people with disabilities.”

■ PolitiFact’s launching a new website to provide “credible, practical” information about personal health.

Trump blames Canada. Accusing our neighbor to the north of discrimination against U.S. autos, alcohol and cheese—and complaining of its wildfires’ impact on air quality—the president’s slapping 50% tariffs on Canadian goods.

■ Chicago’s not out of the woods on lousy air: Those Canadian fires might not end until November.

■ A Tribune editorial (gift link): “Summer once required little more planning than grabbing sunscreen and a towel. Now it requires contingency plans.”

■ Satirist Andy Borowitz: “Canadian Prime Minister Tells Trump That Orange Air is a Tribute to Him.”

Out of the running. Former Illinois public health chief Nirav Shah—condemned by Illinois Democrats for his oversight of a 2015 outbreak of Legionnaires disease at the Quincy veterans home—has dropped his bid to become Maine’s Democratic Senate candidate to replace the scandal-scarred Graham Platner.

■ Late Sen. Lindsey Graham’s sister says she’ll run to replace him for a full term.

■ Democrats could vote this week on which state’s presidential primary will happen first in 2028.

‘ICE is lying.’ Popular Information: Documents prove that Immigration and Customs Enforcement has failed to equip its agents with body cameras.

■ Columnist Jeff Tiedrich paraphrases “Border czar” Tom Homan: “If you get murdered to death by some trigger-happy, masked ICE thug, you definitely had it coming.”

■ Homan has admitted that his job is to “help Stephen Miller”—a guy who columnist Heather Delaney Reese says “has, by every credible account, seized control of immigration enforcement in this country.”

■ The Bulwark: “QAnon conspiracy theorists have taken over a prison. And they’re vowing to fill it with trafficked children.”

A run of corruption? Ex-Jezebel editor-in-chief Laura Bassett: “There’s a severe diarrhea parasite in your lettuce, and Donald Trump’s administration sure appears to be in cahoots with the company to which it was traced.”

■ Historian Heather Cox Richardson, reviewing the Iran war fiasco: “Trump appears to be … less and less relevant to actual governance.”

Superman gets a break. Trump-friendly CBS parent and Stephen Colbert silencer Paramount Skydance’s takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery—parent to DC Comics, as well as CNN and so much more—has run into a legal brick wall, for at least a couple of weeks …

■ … as a federal judge weighs 12 states’ contention that the deal would “substantially lessen competition” in the movie biz.

■ LateNighter marks The Daily Show’s 30th anniversary: “Jon Stewart reinvented late night.”

■ Stewart last night: The World Cup final was “like a reverse Super Bowl—where the players spoke Spanish and the halftime show was in English.”

‘A society of suckers.’ Stop the Presses columnist Mark Jacob: “Prediction markets are perfect examples of how Donald Trump and the oligarchs who conspire with him are building a nation of chumps.”

■ Digital Trends encourages you to visit the online Museum of Endangered Sounds to hear things such as the electronic screech of a 56K modem connecting, the mechanical clunk of a VHS tape loading and a floppy disk drive grinding away.

■ Apple’s raising prices for its Apple Music, Apple One, and AppleCare+ services.

■ Columnist Eric Zorn assesses the relative merits of online navigation apps.

If you know these people, thank them. Chicago Public Square’s closing in on its 10th anniversary—and it wouldn’t have made it this far had readers including Andrew Mitran, Moondog, Harry Politis, Arnie Weissmann, Jane Williams, Chris Schuba, Barry Koehler, Deb Abrahamson, Joe Germuska, Kevin Kassay, Laurie and Bill Bunkers, Judy Davy, Michael Mini, Robert A. Shipley, Rick Lunt, Hilary Mac Austin, Margaret Brennan, Karen Conti, Mary Ellen Nelligan, Alan Hommerding, Mana Ionescu, Jan Czarnik, Matthew Thompson, Ted Cox, Janice Marsh, Jon Lederhouse, Melanie Minnix, Tony Judge, Sandy Schneider, David Mausner, Catherine Johns, Ben Goldgar, Amy Dixon-Kolar, Chris Handzlik, Kate Arias, Barbara Kalina, Jean Davis, Joe Gauss, Paul Wedeen, Sam Hochberg, Ann Johnson Arellano, Scott Tindale, Victoria Quero, Doug Freedman, Paul Colombo, Nancy and Barney Straus, Jerry Ostergaard, Maryanne Peterson and Karen Hand not pitched in to help cover the cost of its production and distribution.

■ Join ’em today for any amount—even just $1, just once—and your name leads off tomorrow’s roll call.

A Square public service announcement in honor of an old friend

‘Unhealthy’ / Companies backing ICE / ‘One bad Apple (update)’

‘Unhealthy.’ The Chicago region faced another day of lousy air …

■ … with some relief by this evening.

■ Yesterday brought us the second-worst air quality of any major city on Earth.
■ Axios: “Chicago may need … to start planning for a yearly ‘smoke season.’”

■ Block Club surveys life in this siege for Chicago’s homeless.

■ The AP explains how to create a do-it-yourself home air filter.

■ The Tribune: The proliferation of warehouses built near homes and schools raises new concern about truck pollution.

Lettuce pray. Business Insider breaks down the risks of explosive diarrhea from eating suspect lettuce for people at three tiers of risk: Low, Medium, and Throwing Caution to the Wind.

■ The Guardian traces the outbreak to Republicans’ deep cuts in public health programs.

■ In what The Daily Beast calls an “embarrassing mistake,” the FDA says a lettuce sample test that triggered a multistate recall delivered a false positive—although the company responsible says it stands by the recall. (Cartoon: Jan Kodner, with ChatGPT.)

■ A University of Arizona microbiologist tells NBC: “The biggest outbreak I’ve seen was 4,000 people, but this looks like it’s going to push 8,000. There’s something different this time.”

■ Cyclosporiasis sent a Wisconsin newlywed to the hospital on her honeymoon in Yellowstone National Park.

Pumped for war. As President Trump’s assault on Iran escalates, the U.S. gasoline price average again is topping $4 a gallon.

■ Columnist Robert Hubbell: “The reckless battle plan … has so depleted U.S. military stockpiles that it impairs our ability to fight another war.”

■ CNN’s Brian Stelter: “The public deserves transparency about the U.S. war in Iran. But that’s not what we’re getting—not even close.”

■ The Onion: “Trump Insists Frequent Naps Necessary To Protect U.S. Interests In Dreamland.”

■ Columnist Jeff Tiedrich on the conclusion of World Cup festivities: “Donny—in his divine role as President of the United States, Supreme Ruler of the Western Hemisphere, Lord-Emperor of the Sky Above and All the Planets, and God’s Own Avatar on Earth—presented the winning team with their trophy … and then … wouldn’t get off the stage.”

‘The most corrupt thing Trump has done since returning to office.’ Pod Save America co-host Dan Pfeiffer says a plan to charge for special high-speed access to the president’s Truth Social posts is a contender.

■ Lifting the curtain on Trump’s cheap-ish “Freedom Fuel” gas stations, The American Prospect finds a pair of lawsuit-embroiled brothers.

■ Columnist and former U.S. Rep. Adam Kinzinger, looking back at the present moment from the distant future, sees “One Nation, Under Trump, Marked Down 70 Percent.”

‘A D and a bunch of B’s.’ Journalism critic Margaret Sullivan rates coverage of Trump’s “awful speech” Thursday night.

■ Free Speech Center director and former USA Today editor Ken Paulson mourns the newspaper editorial’s decline—and offers newsrooms a few suggestions to restore the spirit of editorials.

Companies backing ICE. Popular Information ranks the top 25 consumer brands funding Congress’ biggest Immigration and Customs Enforcement supporters.

■ The New York Times (gift link): Failed immigration cases have left the U.S. attorney’s office in Chicago—among the most prestigious in the country—reeling.

■ An ex-Chicago federal prosecutor tells the Times “there seems to be a pattern of charges being filed without any merit.”

■ Law professor Joyce Vance mourns reports that “the FBI is out of the business of investigating ICE interactions with the public that have gone wrong.”

■ Trump’s Justice Department is proposing to revive what the AP describes as “a secretive and dormant court created 30 years ago to consider government requests to deport so-called ‘alien terrorists.’”

Independence fray. City Cast surveys the challenges that independent candidates are facing trying to get on ballots in Illinois.

■ Satirist Andy Borowitz: “Susan Collins Concerned That Maine Voters Might Remember Things She Has Done.”

‘One bad Apple (update) can spoil the whole week.’ Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg, an Apple fan for 25 years, recounts days of struggle after downloading a new iPhone operating system.

■ A Chicago software engineer is a prime example in what The New York Times (gift link) describes as a flood of Apple App Store offerings created with artificial intelligence.

■ The Onion: “Parents Sit Kids Down For Difficult Discussion About Moving To Ad Tier.”

‘You are my favorite website.’ Those comments last week—accompanied by financial support—from a Chicago Public Square reader are an important part of what keeps this newsletter coming.

■ Join him and others—such as Brent Hoffmann, Tom Butler, Charles Pratt, Susan Hardy, Al Hoyt, Joe McArdle, Mario Greco, Lisa McNulty, Tim Bannon, Leigh Daeuble, Rob Renfro, Deborah J. Wess, Mike Janowski, Maggie Ellsworth, Joseph Pesz, Jeremiah Woods, Alec Bloyd-Peshkin, David Hammond, Judith Krzysko-Jakubowska, Jeffrey Nelson, Julie Ross, Jeanette Mancusi, David Kindler, Matt Griffin, Mike Schultz, Charles Sudo, Karl Schuster, Julia Gray, Anne Rooney, William Lindsey Cochran, Joe Hass, Jan Rogatz, Chris Rhodes, Cate Plys, Victoria Engelhardt, Steve Johnson and Louise Kiernan—and you’ll qualify for some modest expressions of gratitude.