* Michael Hicks on the “great state of Illiana (or is it Idinois?)…

Many downstate Illinois residents dislike Chicago’s strong influence in the state. Last year, a total of 33 counties voted to secede from Illinois and form their own state. Huston invited those counties to join Indiana. He even created a commission to study the possibility.

That’s first-rate trolling.

I thought it’d be fun to think through the prospect of Indiana picking up these 33 counties. Would it be good for Indiana? Would it be good for those counties? Would it be good for the remaining 69 Illinois counties? […]

Adding the [Illinois] secessionist counties to Indiana would cut [Indiana’s] per capita income enough for us to slide from 14th to 11th place from the bottom. Only 18.6% of adults in these counties have completed college, while the Illinois total is 36.7%. This new “secessionist” state would instantly be the least well-educated state and would be right about where the USA as a whole was in the late 1980s.

*** Statehouse News ***

* Capitol News Illinois | Parents: School didn’t help our child after an older child repeatedly sexually assaulted her: A Stonington couple hopes the Illinois General Assembly takes their daughter’s sexual abuse more seriously than the Taylorville school district seems to. Ashley and Chadd Peden (pictured) appeared at a statehouse news conference Wednesday with State Sen. Steve McClure (R-Springfield) and State Rep. C.D. Davidsmeyer (R-Murrayville). Their bill would require an immediate expulsion in such cases.

*** Statewide ***

* NBC Chicago | Real ID appointments filling up ‘fast.’ Tip to know if you want to secure your spot: Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias said last year that his office was stepping up efforts to ensure that residents get REAL ID-compliant identification prior to the May 2025 deadline, but acknowledged there are “tremendous concerns” about what will happen as the deadline arrives. “We feel pressure … Our facilities will swell up, and it will be a problem if people don’t get out and get their REAL ID’s,” he said at the time.

*** Chicago ***

* Tribune | Judge hands 32-month sentence to developer convicted in scheme to bribe Ald. Edward Burke: In sentencing Charles Cui, U.S. District Chief Judge Virginia Kendall said Cui violated the trust the public put in him as a lawyer through his corruption, and exacerbated it by later lying to federal agents and failing to turn over crucial emails to a grand jury in an attempt to cover it up. Kendall also said a message had to be sent to “other developers here in the city, especially those who are trying to make money on real estate and development of properties.”

* WBEZ | Taxpayers are out more than $30 million on University of Illinois’ scuttled South Loop project: The DPI project was still going forward last summer as two pro sports teams — baseball’s White Sox and soccer’s Fire — were looking to build their own, separate stadiums on Auchi’s land. The current status of those stadium plans is unclear. Dutta says it’s possible that the work the companies did on that proposal might still be able to be used to build on the Far South Side site of the planned Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park.

* Tribune | Obama Presidential Center subcontractor sues over cost overruns, alleges discrimination: Robert McGee, the owner of II in One, a South Side firm that provided concrete and rebar services for the center starting in 2021, sued New York-based Thornton Tomasetti in federal court earlier this month, seeking to be paid back for roughly $40 million in construction costs the local firm covered itself along with its joint venture partners. II in One blamed Thornton Tomasetti for changing standards, saying the company made an “improper and unanticipated decision” to impose new rules around rebar spacing and tolerance requirements, subjected the company to “excessively rigorous and unnecessary inspection,” and extensive paperwork that “impacted productivity and resulted in millions in losses.”

* Sun-Times | Art Institute’s elaborately displayed tooth, thought to belong to John the Baptist, turns out not to be: Researchers took samples from the tooth in 2016. The results, not widely disseminated, showed it was from someone in the 5th century, too young to belong to Jesus’ sainted contemporary.

* Tribune | Chicago Sky to face Brazil in a preseason game on LSU’s campus to celebrate Angel Reese and Kamilla Cardoso: The Chicago Sky will play a preseason game against the Brazilian national team on LSU’s campus on May 2. The event will celebrate the team’s pair of second-year stars, pitting Kamilla Cardoso against her native country’s team while bringing Angel Reese back to Baton Rouge for her first game at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center since her senior season with the Tigers.

* Block Club Chicago | Volunteer-Run Avondale Maker Space Raising Funds To Buy Building From Landlord: The volunteer-run membership group has been negotiating with its landlord since at least September; the members will be able to buy the building if they raise $300,000, Plasterer said. […] Close to $100,000 has been raised for the mission so far, said Andrew Wingate, another member leading fundraising efforts. The group has a year to raise the money it needs, and its members hope to find various revenue streams over the next several months.

*** Cook County and Suburbs ***

* Daily Southtown | Teacher’s comment about deportations at Dixmoor school sparks fear as threat of ICE raids loom: Amid community fears of potential raids by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, Guadalupe Gutierrez sensed more chaos when her cousin came home from Dixmoor’s Rosa Parks Middle School crying. “He told me, ‘I’m scared to go out,’” Gutierrez said Tuesday. Gutierrez said her cousin and other students told her their teacher came into class holding up a newspaper with a story about potential mass deportations under President Donald Trump and saying, ‘I can’t wait for this to happen.’” […] The teacher said Thursday that “these are all false allegations,” declining to elaborate further.

* CBS Chicago | Solidarity volunteers patrol Chicago neighborhoods, responding to tips of possible ICE raids: A group in the western Chicago suburbs say they are taking action over changing immigration policy. They’ve created teams looking for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations in progress and responding to tips about immigration detainments. The group describes themselves as advocates for immigrants and says they want them to know their rights. They spent part of their Wednesday making the rounds in Elgin.

* Daily Southtown | Judge reverses special prosecutor decision in Will County veto case: A Will County judge Thursday reversed his December ruling that would have appointed a special prosecutor to represent 10 Will County Board Republicans in a road widening dispute with County Executive Jennifer Bertino-Tarrant. Ten board Republicans filed a lawsuit last year against Bertino-Tarrant after she vetoed a resolution that would have stopped the planned widening of 143rd Street to five lanes through Homer Glen. Bertino-Tarrant originally signed the resolution that asked the county’s division of transportation to explore a three-lane alternative, but later said that was in error and issued the veto.

*** Downstate ***

* WCIA | ‘I strongly denounce this hate’: Champaign mayor responds to council member’s swastika post on Facebook: Council member Davion Williams changed his profile picture to the image of a swastika. The post quickly drew criticism in the comments, with people responding that the symbol is hateful. Williams replied, saying the swastika had been used for thousands of years prior across multiple cultures and religions to represent “good fortune, well-being, and spirituality” and symbolize “peace, prosperity, and the cyclical nature of life.” “I have just seen the swastika on Council Member Davion Williams Facebook page. I strongly denounce this hate,” she said. “I will be issuing a full statement today on this, but I did not want to let this hate happen without taking an immediate stand.”

* WCIA | Central IL nursing administrators call for communication to protect patients: People in long-term care facilities trust people like nurses to take care of them, but some people in the industry in Central Illinois say that doesn’t always happen. They say a nurse in St. Joseph has been disciplined for stealing drugs several times — and she still has an active license. They’re frustrated by what they see as a lack of communication between the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) and the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation (IDFPR). IDPH deals with the violations and disciplines the facilities. But when it comes to individuals who commit the acts, they see them continuing to work with little to no consequence.

*** National ***

* Investigate Midwest | Trump’s funding freeze chills agriculture industry: Rob Larew, president of the National Farmers Union, said farmers and ranchers throughout the U.S. were confused by this week’s order. “We’re getting questions from our members who have made investments on a number of fronts, everything from commercial kitchens to building out processing to even big questions about the IRA,” said Larew, referring to the Inflation Reduction Act. “We have very few answers right now and lots of questions.”

* BOLTS | This City Inspired A New National Standard for Policing Homelessness. Now It’s Cracking Down Even More: Since the campsites opened last summer, many have raised concerns over the conditions, which are gravel lots with portable toilets and no running water. Disability Rights Oregon (DRO) condemned conditions at the sites in letters to Bartholomew and the local police chief in September and October 2024. The organization cautioned that a requirement that residents vacate their plots every week, forcing them to shuttle back and forth between the two designated campsites if they had not secured housing, was “effectively impossible” for some with disabilities.

* AP | RFK Jr. kept asking to see the science that vaccines were safe. After he saw it, he dismissed it: But Kennedy repeatedly refused to acknowledge scientific consensus that childhood vaccines don’t cause autism and that COVID-19 vaccines saved millions of lives, and he falsely asserted the government has no good vaccine safety monitoring. While appearing to ignore mainstream science, he cited flawed or tangential research to make his points, such as suggesting Black people may need different vaccines than whites.

* Reuters | Exclusive: Musk aides lock government workers out of computer systems at US agency, sources say: The two officials, who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation, said some senior career employees at OPM have had their access revoked to some of the department’s data systems. The systems include a vast database called Enterprise Human Resources Integration, which contains dates of birth, Social Security numbers, appraisals, home addresses, pay grades and length of service of government workers, the officials said.