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Isabel’s afternoon roundup
Monday, Aug 10, 2026 - Posted by Isabel Miller * The Triibe…
* IPM Newsroom | Few parents in Illinois opting kids out of required vaccines, data shows: Lo and the co-authors published their map of rising exemptions in January in the Journal of the American Medical Association. […] Most Illinois counties have a non-medical exemption rate under one percent. Six counties in northern and southern Illinois have a two percent exemption rate. The exemption rate is higher in most other states in the Midwest. In one Wisconsin county, between 10-20% of parents are opting their kids out of vaccines.
* The Tribune | As Chicago’s mayoral race takes shape, social media influencers step in — including for Brandon Johnson: The disclosure late last month marks the arrival of a new form of campaign advertising in a Chicago election. The decision by Johnson — who has not yet officially launched a 2027 mayoral bid — is a sign the mayor believes short-video influencers on platforms like Instagram and TikTok hold rising, largely untapped sway over voters as he weighs a reelection run. It’s a strategy that raises thorny questions about compensation and disclosure but one, Johnson campaign director Christian Perry said, that will only grow more common. * CBS Chicago | Activists file police reports alleging crimes by federal agents in Chicago during Operation Midway Blitz: At a news conference, Vásquez said the mass filing of police reports on Monday will be the first of many. “Today’s mass filing is not an exclusive exercise,” she said. “We have chosen our right to file police reports together to make our collective demand for accountability both public and impossible to ignore.” Among those in attendance was Marimar Martinez, who was shot by a U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent last fall in Chicago’s Brighton Park neighborhood. Border Patrol agent Charles Exum shot Martinez five times in October 2025 after agents wrongly claimed she tried to ram into them. * Sun-Times | Tracking every known federal prosecution in Chicago tied to Trump’s deportation blitz: Two defendants have pleaded guilty. Twenty-five have been cleared. Grand jurors refused to indict at least three of the 25, and another member of that group was found not guilty at trial. One of the 25 saw their charges dropped through a deferred-prosecution agreement. Under the terms of such a deal, prosecutors agree to drop charges if a defendant abides by certain terms over a set period of time. Five Midway Blitz defendants struck such a deal, and four are still pending. * Block Club | Obama Presidential Center Releasing More Tickets This Week: Tickets range in price from $15 to $30. They allow entry into the museum, but other parts of the Obama Presidential Center are ticketless and free to explore — including the Forum event space, Home Court athletic facility and Chicago Public Library branch. * Sun-Times | Chicago man gets ‘time served’ in gun turn-in case that angered former U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan: Duncan says he fears Smith’s saga will discourage people from participating in the Chicago Police Department’s gun turn-in program. “I can’t tell you how many people have come up to me and said, ‘I saw the story,’ and they’re like, ‘We’re never turning in a gun,’” Duncan says. “All we want is guns off the street. That’s what we’re trying to do. So it’s all the wrong messaging.” * Sun-Times | Tim Anderson announces retirement from baseball with White Sox, who will honor him Sept. 17: “Definitely a lot of dark moments,” Anderson said. “Got to a point where I couldn’t enjoy it. You see I’m sweating. I still love the game; it just brought too much pain for me. So going back to play is not for me right now in life.” The good moments include two All-Star Game appearances (2021, 2022), one Silver Slugger Award (2020) and one American League batting title. They also include one of the most memorable home runs in Sox history, Anderson’s walk-off homer against the Yankees in the 2021 “Field of Dreams” game. * Block Club | Vienna Beef Restaurant, Factory Store At Bucktown Headquarters Still Happening — In 2027: Known as Vienna Beef Plaza, the development’s restaurant and factory store had initially been slated for a spring 2024 opening, Tom McGlade, a Vienna Beef vice president, previously said. That timeline has since been repeatedly pushed back, partly due to Vienna Beef’s focus on expanding its pickle business in recent years, McGlade told Block Club. * Crain’s | Cook County moves to end decades-old tax buying practice: It’s not clear whether the new fees will discourage buyers from participating in upcoming sales or whether the fees on tax buyers will be sufficient to pay claims of lost equity by property owners who have lost their homes in the previous two years. If not, the county is on the hook to pay claims. “I fully expect the buyers will continue to participate,” Tarver says. “They had a hand in negotiating what those fees will look like. It won’t be as lucrative, but it’s not like they’ll lose money.” * Aurora Beacon-News | As Army Corps study stalls, future still uncertain for Fox River dams: ‘It’s just going to run its course’: Dams have become the subject of removal for numerous reasons, among them benefits to public safety, improved water quality and a better habitat for wildlife. But, at least in the Fox’s case, that suggestion has also been met with opposition, on the grounds that removal would negatively affect recreational use of the river and impact property owners and the cities along the waterway, among other reasons. * Daily Herald | Want to ditch the drop-off line? Maybe there’s a Bike Bus in your kid’s future: About 20 Bike Bus groups are active in Chicago and the suburbs, including in Downers Grove, Glen Ellyn and Woodridge. The results are “we have healthier, safer schools because you have people that are more physically active. There’s also less congestion around the schools. There’s less people driving and healthier air,” Resman noted. Bike buses also build a community, advocates say. * WTVO | Rockford City Council scheduled to elect acting mayor Monday night: The selection was postponed after the city attorney requested additional time to determine the legal procedures required to appoint an interim mayor. The council is set to choose the acting mayor from among its current alderpersons. * Capitol News Illinois | Feds: Southern Illinois coal mine managers concealed ‘deadly conditions’: Though no workers died, prosecutors say the mine managers put more than 100 miners’ lives at risk. The indictments allege that federal regulations and the mine’s own emergency plan required an evacuation after the fire could not be extinguished within 10 minutes. Instead, prosecutors say, managers kept miners working underground for portions of three shifts while trying to fight the uncontrolled fire. * Capitol City Now | Lincoln Library to host a 4-day event learning about the 1908 Race Riots: “1908, we found that there were a series of lynchings all over the United States, and that spurred the formation of the NAACP in 1909,” said Trees. “So many unfortunate, ugly things that people did to one another. So, we felt that we’ve been working for the last 12 months on putting this together with a lot of partners, just to bring forth these things, that we can keep the 1908 race riots before the public, so that the young children know about it. It’s important that my grandchildren learn and those behind us so that we can keep this up.” * Press release | Route 66 Named Honorary Grand Marshal of the 2026 Illinois State Fair Twilight Parade: The highway’s influence extends far beyond transportation. Route 66 has inspired bestselling books, classic songs, television series, and blockbuster films that introduced millions to the romance of the open road. From John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, which immortalized the highway as the “Mother Road,” to Bobby Troup’s iconic song “(Get Your Kicks on) Route 66,” and Disney-Pixar’s Cars, generations have experienced the spirit of Route 66 through American popular culture. Its nostalgic roadside diners, vintage neon signs, quirky attractions, and small-town charm continue to draw travelers from around the world to Illinois and the communities that helped define the Route 66 experience. Many of those moments are captured in the Route 66 Experience, a self-guided educational exhibit located at Gate 2 on the Illinois State Fairgrounds. * Sun-Times | National pediatrics group says all kids 6 months and older should receive flu shot: The guidance from the American Academy of Pediatrics comes before any federal agencies release their own guidelines for the upcoming flu season. Last year, the CDC removed its long-time universal recommendation for the annual flu shot from its childhood vaccine guidance. * WSJ | If You Get in a Car Crash, the Risk Is Growing Your Insurance Won’t Pay: The industry says an uptick in fraud, driven in part by fake claims enhanced with AI tools, is triggering more denials. It also points the finger at attorneys. “People are going to litigation as a first step, instead of a last resort,” said Sean Kevelighan, chief executive of industry group the Insurance Information Institute.” Plaintiff lawyers say they are being made the scapegoat for a problem of the insurers’ own making. * The Ringer | The End of Google Search—and the Internet—as We Know It: Like Condé Nast CEO Roger Lynch, who admitted on the tech news web show TBPN in May that his elite publishing house was already preparing for the worst when it came to the future of inbound traffic referrals from Google. “Last year, I told our teams: Assume there’s no search,” Lynch told the hosts. “You have to have your businesses planned as if search is zero.” He wasn’t alone in his proactive pessimism. Mike Reed, the CEO of USA Today, shared recently on the Rebooting Show podcast that at his company, “our plan is to assume search is gone and build our business in other ways.” Drastic times call for drastic projections, and as Reed phrased it in his interview, more than once: “The traditional Google Search model is broken.” * WaPo | Water systems are ripe for cyberattacks, experts warn after suspected Iranian hacks: In March 2023, the Environmental Protection Agency issued a memo to require that states work with local officials to spot weaknesses in water systems that hackers could exploit, and then develop plans to remediate them. Municipalities could apply for federal grants to help defray costs. But attorneys general in three Republican-led states — Arkansas, Iowa and Missouri — sued, arguing that the memo exceeded the EPA’s authority, failed to provide for public comment and was a financial burden on small towns. The federal appeals court for that region, seen as among the most conservative, halted the rule change. The EPA withdrew it. Late last month, a water utility in the western part of Arkansas, one of the states that sued, was hit with a cyberattack, part of a spate of intrusions into municipal water systems that U.S. spy agencies believe is the work of Iranian regime hackers. The campaign comes as a U.S.-launched war with Iran moves into its sixth month, with Tehran showing no sign of backing down.
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- TNR - Monday, Aug 10, 26 @ 3:06 pm:
== Ramirez will be the most progressive member of the Illinois delegation next year. Why would she leave that? ==
No doubt that she’ll be the most progressive Illinoisian in Congress, but is Tina implying that’s more valuable or prestigious than being mayor of Chicago?
- Rich Miller - Monday, Aug 10, 26 @ 3:22 pm:
=== but is Tina implying that’s more valuable or prestigious than being mayor===
Pretty sure Delia is happy right where she is. Not everyone wants to move up.
I mean a few days ago people were tearing their hair out because Alexi decided to run for mayor.
Pick a lane already.
People are gonna do what they want to do not what you think they should do.