Marist senior Jamari Grant didn’t play football as a sophomore. Last season he was the scout team running back.

So the group of reporters waiting to talk to him after his 53-yard fourth quarter touchdown run helped the No. 7 Redhawks beat No. 5 Brother Rice 20-16 in the “Pulasi Road Super Bowl” was a little intimidating.

“This is my first time [being interviewed],” Grant warned before handling the questions as expertly as he ran for 149 yards on 18 carries. “It was my whole line [responsible for the touchdown]. I love them to death. [Brother Rice] almost had me. I felt tripped a little bit on it. I was scared.”

Grant showed impressive patience as a running back. He calmly waited for his talented line, led by Notre Dame recruit Pat Coogan, to make space.

“I learned that this year,” Grant said. “[Assistant coach Pat Fleming] taught me how to be patient. It’s hard.”

“[Grant] is really fast,” Marist coach Ron Dawczak said. “He was going a million miles an hour all the time. We had to teach him how to slow down. Now he’s showing that patience. He’s really progressed. That’s the value of being a scout team running back. It’s a thankless role but he gained so much experience and he showed what he learned last year.”

Grant’s touchdown helped turn the tide after Brother Rice took a 16-14 lead late in the third quarter when Crusaders junior Mike Fahy tackled a Marist running back for a safety.

“Don’t ever get too high or too low,” Marist quarterback Dontrell Jackson Jr. said. “Our saying is ‘next play best play’ we just try to make the most out of every opportunity.”

The visiting Crusaders (1-1) had an opportunity to win the game in the final minutes. Brother Rice had the ball on its own 27 with 2:37 to play but the Redhawks ‘defense held strong. Jimmy Rolder, who caught a six-yard touchdown pass in the first quarter, knocked down Jack Lausch’s pass on fourth down to seal the win.

“I give all the credit to our senior leadership,” Dawczak said. “Looking in their eyes [after the safety] I could see it didn’t faze them. It would have been easy for the guys to put their heads down but they continued to fight. They believed we were going to fight, scratch, claw, whatever they needed to do to get this win.”

Jackson, a Coastal Carolina recruit, was 9-for-20 for 101 yards and two touchdowns. Senior Collin McGlynn had four catches for 39 yards and Tim Warr caught a 25-yard touchdown pass in the third quarter for the Redhawks.

Lausch was 19-for-33 for 139 yards and one touchdown, a seven-yard pass to Toledo recruit Willie Shaw.

The Crusaders beat Providence last week. The challenges keep stacking up for Brother Rice, which faces No. 1 Loyola on Thursday.

Marist (2-0) beat Notre Dame last week and faces No. 2 Mount Carmel at home next week.

“This gives us a ton of momentum and shows our true character,” Jackson said. “We’re gonna fight for 48 minutes every game. We just kept our composure and kept on going.”

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Citing a “concerning possible trend” in rising COVID-19 infection rates statewide, Gov. J.B. Pritzker on Friday deployed vaccination teams to five hard-hit counties in northwestern Illinois and authorized other local health departments to expand eligibility to get more shots into arms as quickly as possible.

Public health officials say they’ve seen demand slow down in a number of counties, leaving appointments unfilled while the average statewide coronavirus testing positivity rate has increased by 38% in less than two weeks.

That’s why the governor’s health team is allowing local health officials to start giving out doses to any resident 16 or older “at their immediate discretion,” according to the Illinois Department of Public Health.

“We want to avoid a surge, and so we’ve tried to jump on top of this as fast as possible, making sure we’re not only vaccinating more people, but that we’ve got teams that are going to the regions of the state where this is happening, and… effectuating change so that we can bring down the numbers,” Pritzker said during an unrelated South Side news conference.

The troubling uptick also threatens to derail Pritzker’s “bridge phase” plan that had been poised to loosen more business restrictions within weeks.

“We cannot move forward if our metrics are going backward,” Illinois Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike said in a statement.

Pritzker’s latest inoculation edict applies mostly to downstate areas where demand “appears to have waned,” according to the governor’s office. Vaccine demand is still far outpacing supply in Chicago and its collar counties.

Residents should contact their local health departments directly to see if they’ve expanded eligibility.

“Each county is different and local health departments know better how to vaccinate people in their communities as soon as and as equitably as possible,” Ezike said.

Pritzker previously announced plans to open appointments to all residents 16 and up starting April 12, though officials in Chicago and suburban Cook County have said that’ll likely happen closer to May 1 for city-area providers.

For now, Pritzker is also sending “rapid response” vaccination teams to five counties in the northwest portion of the state where experts say they need “to administer doses quickly to blunt increasing trends.”

The state is scheduled to receive an all-time high of nearly 1 million vaccine doses from the federal government next week. With the latest 126,710 shots administered statewide on Thursday, nearly 2 million residents have now been fully immunized, but that’s only 15.4% of the population.

Graph not displaying properly? Click here.

Illinois has averaged 99,449 shots administered per day over the past week, while COVID-19 infection and hospitalization rates — which were near record lows earlier this month — have inched upward just as they did last October before a devastating fall resurgence.

For the first time since Feb. 6, the public health department reported more than 3,000 new cases of the disease in a single day, with 3,002 infections diagnosed among 76,774 tests. That raised the state’s rolling average positivity rate to 2.9%, which had been at 2.1% on March 13.

Hospitals were treating 1,302 COVID-19 patients Thursday night, the most they’ve seen since the end of February — and a 15% increase compared to two weeks ago.

Graph not displaying properly? Click here.

“While these rates are certainly significantly lower than the peak, they represent a potential early warning sign about a possible resurgence,” the state health department said in a statement.

The state also reported 33 more deaths, including that of a Cook County teenager.

Overall, Illinois’ death rate has been falling since late December, but experts agree a rise in cases is typically followed weeks later by rises in hospitalizations and deaths.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Chicago Public Health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady sounded the alarm earlier this week on rising transmission among young people in the 18-39 age range. The governor’s health team noted the city has seen its daily case rate jump by 50% in the last week. Cases are up about 40% in suburban Cook County, where officials still followed the city in easing outdoor dining restrictions Friday in their “cautious approach to reopening.”

Pritzker touted his “aggressive action” against the potential spike about a week after outlining the “bridge phase” plan ahead of a potential full reopening as early as May.

To get to the bridge phase, 70% of residents 65 or older have to receive at least a first dose of vaccine — a benchmark the state will hit “in the coming days,” officials said.

The other requirements are keeping 20% or more of intensive care unit beds open across the state, and keeping hospitalization and death rates flat or declining over a 28-day period. Both those metrics are heading the wrong direction.

“This is very concerning to us and it makes us take a pause here to evaluate these numbers,” Pritzker said. “What we want to do most of all is make sure: is this a blip in the numbers?… Or is this something that could have some sustaining features to it, in which case, obviously we want to be extra careful.”

Over the past year, more than 1.2 million residents have tested positive for the disease, and 21,203 have died.

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Last month, Governor J.B. Pritzker signed a landmark bill on criminal justice reform, which was championed by the Illinois Legislative Black Caucus and grassroots community groups across the state. This monumental policy package will take crucial steps in advancing racial justice in Illinois by enacting long overdue reforms to anti-Black systems of policing, and revising overly punitive sentencing laws.

But while the passage of the ILBC’s historic legislation has been rightly celebrated as a hard won victory, the final language included several glaring omissions, particularly around limiting the power of police unions, who have been the most steadfast and powerful voices against police accountability. If the state legislature is truly serious about reform, they must pursue additional legislation to plug these gaps.

Under fierce pressures from Chicago’s Fraternal Order of the Police and the largest public employee labor union in the nation, the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, the final bill dropped a powerful measure included in the ILBC’s original proposal that would have dismantled systems of police impunity in Illinois.

This provision, originally introduced by Representative Carol Ammons and the Chicago-based Workers Center for Racial Justice as HB 5830, would have prohibited measures in police union contracts that obstruct the open investigation of officer misconduct and thwart efforts to enact meaningful police reform. Many current police contracts, such as Chicago’s, include provisions that undermine fair investigations of misconduct by allowing accused officers time to review evidence, prepare before an investigation starts and limits the mechanisms for handing down discipline.

Under the false guise of protecting workers rights, AFSCME and the FOP pushed lawmakers to remove the right of Illinois residents to hold the police accountable through open investigations and discipline for officer wrongdoing. This has been the way police unions and, by extension, police forces have amassed power that allows for rampant systemic misconduct and office impunity.

Since the early 1960s, police unions have weaponized collective bargaining power to create a firewall for police misconduct. Unlike most union contracts that deal explicitly with wages and compensation, police collective bargaining agreements include provisions that shield individual officers from investigation into misconduct, provide impunity, and in some cases, allow law enforcement to destroy disciplinary records of individual officers. These contracts grant a level of protection enjoyed by no other profession. Doctors can be sued for malpractice, lawyers can be disbarred, even your hairstylist can lose her license for failure to follow health standards. But police officers, who have powers of life and death, rarely face consequences.

In reality, police contracts undermine public safety by allowing police misconduct to go unchecked, often until it is too late. Jason Van Dyke, the officer convicted in the 2014 murder of Laquan McDonald in Chicago, had at least ten excessive force complaints against him at the time of the murder — none of which resulted in disciplinary action. Tracking by the Citizens Police Data suggests that Van Dyke had more complaints filed against him than 94 percent of other officers. Police contracts have allowed law enforcement to terrorize Black people with no recourse and no semblance of justice. Communities aren’t safe when anyone is above the law, including police.

As police unions have amassed power through their contracts, they have also been able to undermine any attempts at police reform through threats and fear mongering. Shortly after the introduction of ILBC’s reform package, the President of the Illinois Association of Police Chiefs said that the provisions would “destroy law enforcement’s ability to keep communities safe.” A representative from the Illinois Fraternal Order of Police said the provisions would lead to “frivolous lawsuits” and was punishing good police.

Police unions routinely give political donations to candidates’ campaigns, making legislators politically beholden to them. By conservative estimates, Illinois police unions have given at least $376,410 to sitting Illinois state legislators. But police unions have also organized walkoffs and slowed their response to 911 calls to put pressure on political officials, a tactic so common it has its own nickname — the “blue flu.”

What’s clear is that with all the praise for reform we heard from lawmakers, many of them still ultimately sided with the police unions. While the Black Caucus was clear-eyed about where the real problems lay, their allies were not willing to take the hard step of curbing the power of police unions. True reform will not be possible until that work is complete, and lawmakers who want to be celebrated as defending Black lives still have work to do.

Erika Maye is the deputy senior director of criminal justice and democracy campaigns at Color Of Change.

Send letters to [email protected].

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Since 2006, federal law has capped annual interest rates on payday loans to active duty military members at 36 percent. The interest rate cap was broadened in 2015 to include several more types of personal, unsecured loans.

In Illinois, meanwhile, payday loan borrowers have been subjected to average annual interest rates of close to 300 percent.

Illinois lawmakers tried to tackle this issue in 2005, and passed a rate cap that was widely heralded. But the industry took advantage of a gaping loophole and then kept right on with their business.

That legislation was painstakingly negotiated over many months. Under the old regime of House Speaker Michael Madigan, most every interest was given a seat at the table and then they were told to hammer out their best deals. Madigan often said he was a big fan of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s use of that same method to pass much of his own legislation.

I don’t know about FDR, but MJM also had mouths to feed. The political machine he built (which was copied by the other legislative leaders) provided a path for his most favored former state staffers into contract lobbying jobs, where they continued running his campaign apparatus as well as representing a huge number of interests under the Statehouse dome. Hiring one of Madigan’s former staffers didn’t necessarily guarantee any specific industry a win, mainly because those folks represented all sides of almost every coin. But it did mean they were listened to. And oftentimes bills couldn’t move until their concerns were addressed, sometimes leading to very complicated laws that appeared on the surface to be wins for liberal Democrats, but, as with the payday loan bill, turned out to be paper tigers.

As always, there were notable exceptions during the years, but this overall approach began to change after the 2018 gubernatorial election. A new liberal Democratic governor and empowered progressive legislators and interests were no longer content to settle for incremental surface wins and pushed for big things like a $15 minimum wage. Madigan for decades would only agree to small minimum wage increases, but he quickly realized he couldn’t stand in the way of that freight train.

Then, as the Legislative Black Caucus truly united for the first time during the tumult of 2020 and began working on a massive package of reform legislation, Madigan found himself under fire from all corners. Federal prosecutors were clearly coming after him, and a steadily increasing number of his own caucus members were growing weary of his leadership and wanted him gone. He needed some allies and he needed them fast.

Those two phenomena, combined with a new and untested (because of the pandemic’s cancelation of 2020’s legislative session) Senate president, a national mood shift and numerous other factors, produced an environment that the Black Caucus fully took advantage of to pass a remarkable number of wide-ranging bills on criminal justice, education and the economy during the brief January lame duck session.

The days of Madigan’s “everyone at the table” incrementalism were ended by straight-up progressive bills that were far from watered down. Madigan’s long and storied career also ended in January. His gambit didn’t work.

Last week, Gov. Pritzker signed into law the Black Caucus’ huge package of bills dealing with economic reform. Among them was SB1792, a bill that basically applied the military’s simple but seemingly effective interest rate cap on payday and other personal loans. The payday loan folks expressed outraged at how they’d been cut out of the process and predicted their industry’s imminent demise.

We’ll see if the industry’s dire predictions turn out to be true, but it’s as plain as day that massive change is happening, not just in the types of bills that have passed, but in how they’ve passed.

The question now is whether January’s session was a super-intense brushfire that will burn itself out and/or be extinguished by more moderate Democrats, or whether the path the General Assembly is on will be sustained.

Case in point, Rep. Curtis Tarver’s,D-Chicago, bill to eliminate qualified immunity for police officers advanced out of committee last week.

The Black Caucus’ criminal justice reform bill originally contained that qualified immunity provision, as well as limits on collective bargaining rights for police unions. But their bill was only able to gain enough votes when they agreed to strip out those items at the request of some moderate Democrats.

Tarver’s bill could put more heat on those same moderates and create tension within the party. So, this bill could be one to watch.

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Eight people shot, one dead.

Seeing the horrible news crawler across my TV screen, for a moment, I was confused.

Did someone post old news? Or did this really happen so soon after a mass shooting at a South Side warehouse party left two people dead and 15 wounded?

Sadly, it wasn’t an error.

Early Friday, two men started shooting inside a building in Wrightwood, killing a 26-year-old man and leaving seven others in need of medical care.

Yet I count us lucky because of what recently happened in Atlanta, where a white gunman killed eight people, six of them women of Asian descent, leading many to label the shooting a hate crime.

Soon after that, a man suspected of having a mental illness opened fire at a grocery store in Boulder, Colorado. Ten people were killed there, including a police officer.

That last shooting is part of a plague that, like the pandemic, also seems to target a vulnerable population — in this case, police officers, who have become targets in Chicago as well. Four police officers have been shot in Chicago in two weeks, making the city feel more like a war zone than a place to call home.

In one of the shootings, prosecutors said a man shot an innocent person to “lure” police to the area “because he wanted them to kill him.”

The suspect, Tracey Thomas Jr., has been charged with the attempted murders of five police officers.

This unprecedented assault on police officers comes at a time the Chicago Police Department is trying to strengthen its ties with communities experiencing high crime.

In recent months, I’ve witnessed police officers participate in prayer vigils on corners that are under siege by folks up to no good. And I wonder how these officers keep up their morale.

Police Supt. David Brown took over a department embarrassed by scandal at the top and hampered by mistrust at the bottom. Yet he had to stand before the cameras after each gun atrocity and say something that was supposed to give us hope.

As he did again on Thursday.

“Here in Chicago — it’s the idea that cops are putting their lives on the line every day, and it seems that these offenders are acting with impunity, and yet, with hypercriticism, officers continue to run toward danger,” Brown said at a news conference after an officer was shot and wounded in Brighton Park.

We should all remember police officers and their families in our prayers. They need it.

And so do we. With the police under this kind of fire, what are we supposed to do?

It used to be that I felt pretty safe during daylight hours in specific neighborhoods and particular places. But when gunfire breaks out at a Home Depot and cops are getting shot on the regular, it’s clear that there is nowhere to hide.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the number of gun deaths across the country is staggering — 39,707 in 2019. We consider ourselves to be such a progressive country. But the U.S. gun homicide rate is 25 times that of other high-income countries.

And, for all of the progress that Black folks have made, we represent most of the victims of these killings. We are 10 times more likely than white Americans to be shot to death, according to the Everytown Research and Policy.

The news media need to run a daily tally of gun deaths in this country just like we do with COVID-19. Perhaps then more elected officials would be willing to take up the fight to pass more restrictive gun laws.

We’ve fought too hard to defeat the COVID-19 pandemic to succumb to the epidemic of gun violence.

Contributing: Grace Asiegbu

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A man who was wounded in a shootout with a Calumet City police officer Thursday was arrested at a hospital in northwest Indiana.

About 4:50 p.m., an officer pulled a vehicle over in the 500 block of Jeffrey Avenue for a traffic violation, Calumet City police said in a statement.

The driver, a 27-year-old man, got out of the vehicle and allegedly pointed a gun at the officer, who pulled out his own gun and fired shots, striking the man, police said.

The man ran back to his vehicle and allegedly fired multiple shots at the officer before driving off, police said.

He was later found at St. Catherine Hospital in East Chicago, Indiana, where he was taken into custody, police said. A gun was recovered at the scene.

Charges are pending.

The Illinois State Police Public Integrity Task Force is investigating.

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During the 1987 Chicago teachers strike, high school football games were being canceled left and right. Classes? Oh, yeah, those, too. But no football was outrageous! So we donned our jerseys, took to the streets and protested outside City Hall while William Bennett, Secretary of Education under President Ronald Reagan, glared into any television camera he could find and called the city’s public schools the worst in America.

All of which is to say I wouldn’t understand the mechanics of Ken Pomeroy’s renowned “Pythagorean expectation”-based college basketball ratings if you spotted me a slide rule, a scientific calculator and a pair of thick-rimmed glasses held together by strips of masking tape.

But even I am capable of grasping this: Loyola got jobbed.

Of the top eight KenPom teams heading into the NCAA Tournament, four were deemed No. 1 seeds by the selection committee, three were No. 2 seeds and the eighth was — wait, what? — a No. 8 seed. Yes, the Ramblers. If you believe in KenPom at all (and to be clear, I’m not smart enough to know if I do), you can plainly see that something here is amiss.

I didn’t think much about the Ramblers’ seeding when the bracket first came out. I was too excited about a potential second-round matchup against top-seeded Illinois. I wanted my two hours of college basketball lover’s bliss. I even wrote that the Ramblers and their supporters should let the disrespect roll right off their backs and just enjoy the moment.

But now that Georgia Tech and the Illini have been left in crumpled heaps, I’m seeing it: I was wrong. And that’s just one of 10 things I know as we get ready for Saturday’s Loyola-Oregon State tilt in the Sweet 16.

2. The hardest part for the Ramblers is over. As poorly as Illinois played in a 71-58 loss, it’s still unquestionably better than Oregon State, Syracuse and Houston, the other three teams left in the Midwest region.

That’s not to say getting all the way to another Final Four should happen. There are no “shoulds” at this point in the season. Everybody still alive is playing too well. Besides, we’re still on Planet Earth and any Loyola “W” in the tournament is still a huge deal in and of itself.

3. In a sense, the hardest part for the Ramblers has been over since a week before the season was scheduled to start. That’s when “the whole team,” as coach Porter Moser put it, came down with COVID-19, leading to a three-week pause. But there would be no derailing this group.

Photo by Sarah Stier/Getty Images

4. Senior center Cameron Krutwig is a tremendous player and an absolute delight, but his teammates still aren’t getting nearly enough attention. Lucas Williamson, Aher Uguak and Keith Clemons are the best defensive trio in the tournament.

As Illini coach Brad Underwood put it last weekend, “We tried everything in the bag.”

Until there was nothing left but lint.

5. ESPN’s Jay Bilas likened Illinois’ strangely passive defense against Krutwig to electing not to send a pass rush at Tom Brady. So Krutwig and Brady are basically equals now, in case you were wondering.

6. For the second straight game, the Ramblers will face an all-major-conference lead guard and a 7-footer in the middle. Not that the Beavers’ Ethan Thompson and Roman Silva are as good as Ayo Dosunmu and Kofi Cockburn — they aren’t — but that kind of one-two punch is always a lot to contend with.

7. His name is Tom Hitcho. He’s the longtime Loyola associate athletic director who pushes Sister Jean’s chair, sits with her during games and fist-bumps her after victories. And it’s high time America fell in love with him, too.

No, not really.

Photo by Michael Hickey/Getty Images

8. No one ever chased the dream more than Beavers coach Wayne Tinkle did as a player. He played professionally in Belgium, Sweden, Spain, Italy and Greece, made three stops in the former Continental Basketball Association and even logged time in the former International Basketball League.

As a coach, the 55-year-old took Montana to the Big Dance three times and, now, the Beavers twice. His wife and three kids all played big-time college ball, too. What a basketball story his life has been.

9. Some betting numbers: Oregon State is +700 to reach the Final Four, Syracuse is +500, Loyola is +170 and Houston is +115.

In case you were thinking of the Ramblers as the favorites now to come out of the Midwest, the answer is nope.

10. “It’s more than the wins. It’s the journey of spending time with a great group.”

Those were Moser’s words after the Final Four loss to Michigan in 2018. They’re as true as ever now. Win or lose Saturday and beyond, all the current Ramblers will come to this realization.

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The death of journalism III

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By Dennis Byrne,
today at 3:04 pm

Lickspittles in the White House press corps prop up Joe Biden

PBS White House reporter Yamiche Alcindo gave new meaning to “obsequious” during her questioning of President Joe Biden during the first press conference of his tenure on Thursday.

The press conference was long anticipated. Would the press would treat Biden with the same hostility that characterized their frequent interrogations of former President Donald Trump?

With some exceptions, a number of the 30 reporters present displayed a dismaying streak of deferential brown-nosing–no surprise there–confirming the widely-shared public perception that the media is singing the progressive/liberal/Democratic libretto.

But Alcindor engaged in the kind of ass-kissing that even some in the media thought went beyond the pale. She asked Biden:

You’ve said over and over again that immigrants shouldn’t come to this country right now … That message is not being received. Instead, the perception of you that got you elected as a moral, decent man is the reason a lot of immigrants are coming to this country and are trusting you with unaccompanied minors.

How do you resolve that tension and how are you choosing which families can stay and which ones can go … and is there a timeline for when we won’t be seeing these overcrowded facilities run by CBP when it comes to unaccompanied minors? [Emphasis added.}

Not just a slow pitch. The question sat there motionless, like a tee-ball waiting there for a six-year-old to knock it out of the park.

Mind you, she is the face of the tax-supported Public Broadcasting System’s acclaimed Newshour. She has her own fawning pack, like this sophomoric and kissy-face article, “Bringing the Hard Truth to America” in Rolling Stone. That today’s journalists think their job is to bless America with their “truth” is exactly the problem with the one-proud profession today.

Arguably, the most gnawing of omissions was the failure to ask a single question about the coronavirus pandemic. For example, does he accept the CDC’s most recent switch in “the science,” saying that a 3-foot separation in schools is acceptable social distance in schools instead of the earlier (firmly stated) 6-foot distance? Why did no one press him on this administration’s false claims that it had to start “from scratch” to vaccinate America?

He wasn’t pressed on his promise to be a unifier. Instead he was allowed to imply that he would ram through his agenda if Republicans didn’t get on board. No reporter seemed bothered by the pile of debt that his administration is willing to roll up–an insignificant concern in the left’s s view, but a legitimate topic for debate. And so on.

Some reporters did their jobs, pressing Biden, for instance, about when the overcrowded border cells holding undocumented immigrant children traveling alone would be open to the media.

But even Jennifer Rubin writing in the Washington Post, lamented: “Biden excels at his first news conference. The media embarrass themselves. She wrote: “The repeated questions on the same topic [immigration] were tiresome and a poor use of precious time….

The media did not distinguish themselves. By asking about immigration multiple times and echoing the false narrative that Biden had created a “surge,” they showed they were more interested in sound bites than actual news. Their failure to ask about the pandemic, the recession, anti-Asian violence, climate change or even infrastructure (Biden had to bring it up himself) was nothing short of irresponsible. They pleaded for a news conference and then showed themselves to be unserious. They never laid a glove on Biden; they did, however, make the case for why these events are an utter waste of the president’s time.

They should not be a waste of our time. Go back and review other presidential press conferences. Especially those of John Kennedy, whose wit and wisdom made his not only entertaining but informative. (Here and here.)

The failure of the media to do their job and the all-too-obvious (but never admitted to) bias is sickening. One of the left’s favorite tropes is how the political right is destroying democracy, yet by abandoning their constitutionally protected role by itself constitutes a dire threat to democracy.

Related:

• The Death of Journalism I: A Fox news reporter blows a fantastic story at the border.
• The Death of Journalism II: Examples of how the once honorable profession is cutting its own throat

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A man was found dead Friday in Lake Michigan at Calumet Beach on the South Side.

The body was found in the water about 1 p.m. near the 9800 block of South Avenue G, according to a statement from Chicago police.

A fire department spokesman said he was initially taken in critical condition to Trinity Hospital.

He was later pronounced dead, and detectives were investigating the cause of his death, police said.

The Cook County medical examiner’s office hasn’t released his name or autopsy results.

On Thursday, a dead body was found in the Chicago River between Columbus and Lake Shore drives.

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Good afternoon. Here’s the latest news you need to know in Chicago. It’s about a 5-minute read that will brief you on today’s biggest stories.

This afternoon will be mostly cloudy with a high near 50 degrees. Tonight’s low will be around 43 degrees. Tomorrow brings a chance of thunderstorms in the afternoon with a high near 62 degrees, while Sunday will be mostly sunny and breezy with a high around 51 degrees.

Top story

Munoz rips Proud Boy planning run for his state senate seat

State Sen. Antonio Munoz today denounced a member of the far-right Proud Boys who was present for the riot at the U.S. Capitol and now plans to challenge the Chicago Democrat in next year’s election.

Edgar “Remy Del Toro” Gonzalez told us this week that he intends to run as an independent against Munoz, whose 1st District covers portions of the South and West sides.

In a statement, Munoz said Gonzalez’s announcement amounts to “a hate-fueled threat to my district from someone who’s already shown his reprehensible, un-American behavior.” He said it was ironic his plans were made known as Illinois lawmakers were authorizing a wider use of mail-in voting in future elections and other provisions to make voting easier.

“On the day we passed a bill that would expand voting rights, a racist Proud Boy who attacked our democracy at the U.S. Capitol announced he wants to run for office,” said Munoz, who co-founded the Latino Caucus and has held the seat since 1999.

Gonzalez previously led the Chicago chapter of the Proud Boys and is still affiliated with its overarching Northern Illinois contingent. He said he had started collecting signatures to get on the ballot, but state election rules prevent independent candidates running in next year’s election from circulating petitions before March 29, 2022 — meaning any signatures Gonzalez has already collected are worthless.

Asked about the statement from Munoz, Gonzalez, who is also Latino, said the senator made a “big mistake throwing the racist card.”

Read Tom Schuba’s full story here.

More news you need

1. Gov. J.B. Pritzker deployed vaccination teams to five hard-hit counties in northwestern Illinois today and authorized other local health departments to expand eligibility to any resident 16 or older “at their immediate discretion” in an effort to vaccinate as many people as possible. The average statewide coronavirus testing positivity rate has increased by 38% in less than two weeks.
2. The low number of hate crimes against Asians and Asian Americans reported in Chicago may be in part because of a reluctance to report racism or harassment, advocates say. Language barriers and immigration status could also be factors, according to Inhe Choi, executive director of the HANA Center.
3. Winners of consumer lawsuits are often shocked to learn that legal fees awarded to their lawyers for handling the cases are taxable income — for them. Read Stephanie Zimmermann’s report on a tax code problem that’s only gotten worse because of changes implemented under the Trump administration.
4. Renowned Chicago blues guitarist Dion Payton died March 12 after years of struggling with multiple health issues. Payton, who formed the 43rd Street Blues Band, performed live in front of rock legends like Mick Jagger, Jimi Hendrix and Bono. He was 70.
5. A pair of Chicago siblings are launching a business that will send four electric vehicles downtown to offer free rides in a designated area. The company plans to make money by covering the vehicles, which don’t exceed 25 mph, in advertisements.
6. In an attempt to keep students engaged during Chicago Public Schools’ spring break next week, a series of events dubbed “Spring Forward” will be held in the city. The campaign includes physical activities, community service events, a virtual college fair and a virtual “Know Your Rights” workshop, the mayor’s office said.

A bright one

Sister Jean hopes Loyola will make a comeback ‘to the very top’ of NCAA Tournament

In the days between NCAA Tournament games, Sister Jean Dolores Schmidt’s schedule is full.

“I have to get up early in the morning to do what I have to do,” she said. “Besides doing my work for Loyola, I’m doing my work for the basketball team. I write the team so many emails while they’re … quarantined in the hotel.”

As the 101-year-old chaplain for the Loyola men’s basketball team, Sister Jean said she writes the team an email before and after every game, explaining what players can expect and detailing some areas to improve upon.

Courtesy of Loyola University Chicago

Sister Jean said Loyola’s team that made it to the Final Four in 2018 and the school’s present team are more alike than they are different, as both demonstrated the same energy and great teamwork.

“When they do plays, they keep passing the ball to the person they think will make the basket,” Sister Jean said. “They don’t care who makes the points as long as the basket is made.”

The chaplain said she has waited for another NCAA win for Loyola since 1963 and is excited for the team to excel whether that means they get to the Final Four again or go further.

“I told them, ‘We can do it, so let’s push,'” Sister Jean said.

Read Mari Devereaux’s full story here.

From the press box

Cubs star Javy Baez sat down with our Russell Dorsey to discuss his approach to the upcoming season and how the price of fame almost robbed him of his love for baseball. “It kind of pulled me away from everything, even from my family. My family and my friends,” Baez said of the attention he got off the field.

And Bulls forward Lauri Markkanen had a feeling he would remain in Chicago past yesterday’s trade deadline. He ended up being proven correct, Joe Cowley writes, as rumors of Markkanen’s imminent departure to New Orleans or some other NBA city didn’t come to fruition.

Your daily question ?

What’s a food you didn’t like as a kid but enjoy eating now?

Email us (please include your first name and where you live) and we might feature your answer in the next Afternoon Edition.

Yesterday, we asked you: How do you feel about the Bulls’ new additions, including Nikola Vucevic? Here’s what some of you said…

“He will give the Bulls a much needed boost. Reshapes the front court with LaVine. This team wants to win sooner rather than later.” — Angel A. Alicea

“They gave up way too much for just one person. He’s already 30 which would make him one of the oldest person on the team.” — Al Neal

“Solid trade. This guy will make a huge difference.” — Gus Santana

Thanks for reading the Chicago Afternoon Edition. Got a story you think we missed? Email us here.

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