How will librarians be able to plan programming, do outreach, and get to know regulars while bouncing around from branch to branch? Your guess is as good as mine. Call your alder and leave a message this weekend. We need all of our staff restored. Find your alder at bit.ly/callmyward

I see people claiming the head tax is going to public libraries, but as far as we’ve been told- it isnt. The good news is, our lackluster book budget may be restored. The bad news? We’re still facing 89 positions cut. After 52 positions were cut last year. That’s 11% of our workforce!

“The high-profile operations have led to surges in arrests. But they've also galvanized local resistance efforts, and created a playbook for activists in other cities when ICE comes to town.”

5 headlines tonight on Charlotte Observer’s homepage: “Manolo's Bakery closes to protect customers” “Church members flee as federal agents arrive” “Super G executive describes agents dragging out teen employee” “Border Patrol questions people at Walmart” “Border Patrol sweep sparks fear”

“Gimenez Gonzalez, an outspoken advocate for migrant day laborers in Chicago, was released on Oct. 28 after 47 days in custody. ICE detained him despite his legal work permit, a pending asylum case and no criminal record.” www.hpherald.com/evening_dige...

TW: video showcasing a violent display of force by federal agents From Charlotte, NC. Seen it shared on a few NC based IG pages. Based on this video, federal agents using the same tactics we’ve seen the last few months in Chicago.

When people say the law should be "applied neutrally" and "without politics" -- that doesn't means anything. There is no neutral application of the law. Every decision to stop someone, to question them, to arrest or not, to charge, to seek the death penalty etc is a political choice.

"300 agents stormed the building, rappelled from a helicopter, knocked down doors and hurled flash-bang grenades. Agents ziptied and detained many US citizens for hours..." Prosecutors have not filed a *single* criminal charge against anyone arrested that night: www.propublica.org/article/chic...

Every decade, we hear "the kids can't read or write!" Interventions that don't work are proposed. Those that do work are ignored: reducing class sizes, making kids & families feel safe at school and welcome, becoming a community resource. When their expensive reform fails, they yell at us again.

It’s not just about recognizing class politics, it’s about refashioning class politics to be a critique of capitalism, exploitation, and privatization instead of reactionary, punitive, deficit-minded, equality in suffering bullshit.

nineteen people arrested during today’s protest outside the broadview ice detention center were charged with “obstruction/disorderly conduct/walking on highways,” per the latest update from ccso. one person was charged with “mob action/obstruction/disorderly conduct.” one person’s charges tbd.

Neighbor from one of those towns named—Broadview is our community. I woukd never call someone from say Melrose Park an out of towner. That is crazy talk. But beyond that the stuff happening there affects the whole Chicagoland community and the mayor needs to acknowledge that

at one point, i watched a cook county sheriff’s officer (who appears to be in charge) point out a priest in the crowd. he and a couple officers then went into the crowd , dragged him into the street, and arrested him. situation is still tense as crowd jostles with police to get into the street.

"I don’t know when I will see my father again. For now, I carry the weight of his sacrifice while navigating the gaping hole left by his departure." chicago.suntimes.com/columnists/2...

Turning off replies because I'm not interested in debate. I'm right. Also, don't tell me that the state cops protect us from ICE when I was personally brutalized by ICE in the presence of a mob of state cops. Police do not protect protesters. That's simply not how they exist in relation to us.

I realize that it's part of the governor's strategy to keep the National Guard at bay, but facilitating a violent, occupying force to keep another arm of the occupation at bay is not the only strategy, and it's one worthy of critique. Also, all state charges against protesters should be dropped NOW.

Alderman Sigcho-Lopez was right to call out Pritzker today about the state police arresting protesters. Pritzker responded that the state police are protecting protesters, and that just isn't true. State cops have arrested and brutalized protesters to facilitate ICE operations. That's reality.

An interesting tidbit in the joint status report filed in the Broadview ICE facility case today: ICE says video from inside the facility "between October 19, 2025, and October 31, 2025, has been irretrievably destroyed" and can't be produced in discovery. www.courtlistener.com/docket/71832...

[email protected] if you need whistles in Chicago or out! Willing to ship, get in touch. Please share, repost, what have you. I have like 18kg of filament and I refuse to stop printing.

Since June, more than 1000 immigrants like Diana whose arrests in Chicago were unlawful have already been deported, despite them being eligible for 1) bond release, and/or 2) ongoing immigration & asylum hearings. So happy Diana is coming home, but we have to keep up the pressure. Be relentless.

NEW: @propublica.org investigated the Chicago apartment raid where kids were zip-tied and citizens detained for hours. They find: - NONE of the arrested were criminally charged - NO evidence the building was "filled with TdA terrorists." - ZERO legitimate reason for DHS to rappel from a Blackhawk.

some great news despite the fact that she never should've been abducted in the first place—and the people who did it won't face any repercussions

America’s civic ethical norms are obsessed with worship of and obsequiousness to power, and particular with the images and ideas projected by those in power. But this is functionally incompatible with having a society grounded in a coherent reality and able to exercise effective sense-making.

Chicago Public Library's budget cuts would mean losing HALF of the materials budget. It would mean losing 90 staff members. Cop budget's fine, though.

Our editorial stance is kidnappings are bad. This is not Real Journalism because it's important to be neutral about atrocities

"The next year, after they were introduced by Perkins, Wright hired Mahony at his burgeoning practice, which eventually became his Oak Park, Illinois, studio. In 1898, Mahony became the first woman in Illinois to secure her architecture license." www.dwell.com/article/mari...

Something absolutely perfect about Larry Summers riffing about the scourge of woke cancel culture being unfair to predatory men in a friendly email to his pal JEFFREY EPSTEIN.

just opening up the new Epstein docs at random:

So many questions

The crisis of elite impunity that is ruining our society cannot be more clearly or convincingly demonstrated than with the fact that all of these people wrote all this stuff into an email and hit Send.

This is absolutely the tactic. So many arrests were just someone taking a step over a line, or not knowing new rules the cops just made up, or at curfew, cops targeting protesters who were mouthy earlier in the day. Or no apparent reason at all. Prosecutors really should drop all of these.

Now in the courtroom in Chicago's Dirksen Federal Courthouse, waiting for the Broadview Six's arraignment hearing to begin. The courtroom is packed with press and observers.

Protestors gathering for rally in support of @michaelrabbitt.bsky.social, @catsharpforcook.bsky.social, @katmabu.bsky.social and others indicted in attack on 1st Amendment rights to protest fee gov’t’s attacks on Chicagoans news.wttw.com/2025/10/29/d...

“'There is a real disconnect between the stated purpose of the Unified Command and the violent force the Illinois State Police is using to repress free speech'"

"But dozens of demonstrators have been arrested since state and local law enforcement assumed responsibility for monitoring the protests. Protesters and legal observers say the arrests conflict with the governor’s stated goals." --> and state law aka the TRUST Act...

"But officials have revealed little about what led to the arrests. The ISP haven’t fulfilled Block Club’s public records requests from mid-Oct. seeking reports for every protester arrested in Broadview." blockclubchicago.org/2025/11/12/p...

Cannot even. “‘If (the officer) did not step in and expedite the arrest, this could have turned into a much worse situation,’ [Police Chief] Nord’s statement read.”

You don’t. No one should even be talking about reforming this. Abolition is the only path through this.

the scope of the feds’ invasion cannot be overstated. this isn’t limited to chicago or even cook county.

Since Midway Blitz began, ICE and Border Patrol have ripped people out of cars and buildings, disappearing thousands; deployed chemical weapons against whole communities; abused - per ongoing legislation - press and clergy; and held people - per more litigation - in inhumane conditions at Broadview.

absolutely. which is why this was the definition for AI that @mjcrockett.bsky.social and I included in our recent TiCS article

“If Congress revisits the ACA credits in December—and that’s a big if—we can expect the fight over abortion coverage to bleed into that vote, and for Republicans to try to attach those abortion restrictions.” open.substack.com/pub/jessica/...

it's also fun that she's incinerating him in between cute cat posting while he's running around the sight weeping and insisting he has a soul.

This is exactly correct.

Thinking about when Willie Wilson said police “should be able to chase them [anyone who runs from police] down, and hunt them down like a rabbit,” and Paul Vallas wanted to “take the handcuffs off police.” Everyone’s getting to see what that looks like in practice now & they don’t seem to like it.

“The incident [=1 y.o. baby being pepper sprayed] came amid a weekend blitz on Little Village, Cicero and Oak Park, where a Girl Scouts food drive was halted Saturday after the troop encountered federal agents.”

Rafael Veraza was trying to leave a Sam’s Club parking lot when a federal agent drove alongside a line of cars, spraying chemical irritants occupants of the vehicles through open windows — including his 1-year-old daughter, Ariana. “My daughter didn’t have to go through this."

"Are you for, or against, a taxpayer-funded secret police terrorizing American cities?" - @hkappklote.bsky.social ASK EVERYONE YOU KNOW THIS, REGARDLESS OF WHERE THEY LIVE

The way the "free speech zones" at Broadview were put up, have been policed, and continually keep shrinking is a microcosm of what's happening to free speech in America as a country.