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* Click here for the background. WCIA in May…
During Kristi Noem’s visit to Springfield on Wednesday, she spoke in front of the former residence of Emma Shafer.
Shafer, 24, was found stabbed to death in her apartment in 2023. Her ex-boyfriend, Gabriel Calixto-Pichardo, is accused of killing her. Police are still looking for him.
Shafer’s death rocked the city. She was a pillar of the activist community, and had organized for several different causes, including immigrant rights.
On Wednesday, Noem speculated about Shafer’s case and used her death as a political talking point, and not only without her family’s consent, but while Shafer’s mother was actively protesting Noem’s trip to Springfield.
Shafer’s family members released this statement after Noem’s speech…
My daughter Emma radiated love and light everywhere she went and for all people. Even as a child, she was a friend to everyone and someone who spoke up for the less fortunate. She dedicated her life – her career and her free time – to causes of social justice and equity. That was just who she was.
To see her used by Secretary Noem and others to advance a cruel and heartless political agenda is not just deeply painful to us – it is an insult to her memory. Noem’s words are in direct conflict with who Emma was as a person. Emma built up community and stood with all members, including immigrants.
No parent should have to experience the loss of a child. But every time her name is brought into these conversations – conversations she would have wanted nothing to do with – we have to relive the pain of her death.
Secretary Noem, as a mother still grieving the loss of a child, I beg you to stop. This is not who she was. This is not helping us. Her memory should live in all the people she touched and the causes that she fought for. And I ask all of you to remember Emma as she was. And to live your life as she did: with courageous empathy and love for all.
The Sangamon County State’s Attorney’s Office, Springfield Police Department and the U.S. Marshal’s Service jointly announced late last month that Calixto was apprehended in Mexico.
* Today, the Tribune Editorial Board used Emma Shafer’s memory to take a weird swipe at the governor…
For Pritzker, who is eyeing a White House run, Noem’s charged narrative gave him an opportunity to present himself as an antidote to the Trump administration’s excesses.
Yet Pritzker, too, has gone way too far. His recent rhetoric personally insulting the president does not serve the state’s interests. And his comments about how Chicago and Illinois don’t need federal help to fight crime were always ill-advised, as this page warned. Pritzker’s comments ran into a hail of bullets over Labor Day, with nine killed and 52 wounded in the city’s most violent weekend of the summer.
Contrary to Pritzker’s wishful thinking, Chicago and Illinois most certainly do need robust cooperation between local, state and federal authorities to stop violent crime — and bring dangerous criminals such as Shafer’s killer to justice. The fact that state and local authorities worked together with federal marshals to make progress in the Shafer case is an example of the good results that can happen when law enforcement professionals tune out hotheaded pols and do their jobs.
* Here is the governor during a press conference last week…
Pritzker: I refuse to play a reality game show with Donald Trump again. What I want are the federal dollars that have been promised to Illinois and Chicago for violence prevention programs that have proven to work. That is money that Illinois taxpayers send to the federal government, and it’s an insult to any and every citizen to suggest that any governor should have to beg the president of any political party for resources owed their people. I’d like to ask a question of my own, and it’s one the press should be asking as well. When did we become a country where it’s okay for a US president to insist on national television that a state should call him to beg for anything, especially something we don’t want.
* Pritzker met with members from community violence intervention organizations last week. Press release…
Studies indicate that CVI programs are remarkably effective in preventing violent crime and making neighborhoods safer. President Trump froze $158 million for violence prevention programs and rescinded more than $800 million in anti-violence and crime reduction grants nationwide.
Illinois has a number of CVI programs and partners with a clear track record of success. The Peacekeepers program sends trained community members out to de-escalate and mitigate conflicts in the most violent hotspots in the city. Those interventions were found to have decreased shootings 41% in program areas, with a 31% decrease in the surrounding community.
Since taking office, Governor Pritzker has worked to address the root causes of violence through evidence-based policy. The Reimagine Public Safety Act (RPSA) has invested $250 million in trauma-informed, evidence-based programs to reduce gun violence. He has also invested historic amounts in law enforcement – Illinois ranks 6th in the nation and 1st in the Midwest for per-capita police spending, well above the national average.
Those strategies have proved effective, as crime in Chicago has dropped significantly – despite President Trump’s false claims to the contrary. Murders are down more than 30% in the past year and cut in half since 2021. Robberies are down 33% from 2024 and 37% since 2023. Shootings, burglaries, and motor vehicle thefts are all similarly down in the last year.
* August 29…
Pritzker: I also want to be clear that if [the federal government] would talk to me, they would hear that the business people in the city of Chicago for example, and maybe President Trump would listen to that. What they want is for us to interrupt violence. They want us to use violence interruption tactics. And organizations that are very effective, like Chicago CRED for example, the work they do in the communities has brought down crime by 73 percent in the toughest neighborhoods across the city of Chicago.
That’s what works. And you know what President Trump did in the face of that? He cut funding for those programs from the federal government. That doesn’t help us fight crime. He’s defunding police. He’s defunding our efforts to fight crime at so that he can send troops into the city of Chicago. For one reason, I want everybody to pay attention. What the reason is? It’s about the elections in 2026 and about interrupting our ability to have a fair and free election in 2026 we’re not the only targeted city. He’s talked about lots of other cities. We’re just the first one outside of Washington DC where he has federal control. We’re the first one that he wants to invade, and it’s for that purpose. And not about fighting crime.
* August 28…
Pritzker: I’ve done that as governor, but we should absolutely be promoting more police hiring in cities like Chicago and all across the state. He ought not be taking money away from violence prevention programs that the federal government had been funding, but now they’re taking that money away. And by the way, why are they doing that? Why is he defunding the police? Because he wants to give major tax breaks to the wealthiest people in this country. It’s not right. He needs to be called out on it. I’m doing that. I hope more people will as well.
* August 27…
Pritzker: I want to point out the state of Illinois is 19th best among the 50 states in terms of violent crime. In other words, we’re in the best half of all the states in terms of violent crime. We’ve been working very hard to make that happen, and the city of Chicago isn’t even in the top 25 major cities with high crime rates, because we’ve worked to bring it down, we got more work to do. Every death is a tragedy. Every crime that’s committed is a tragedy, and we need to protect our families and help the victims of violent crime, but Donald Trump has defunded the programs that would help us most to make sure that we’re interrupting violence and also providing the kind of coordination between federal law enforcement and state law enforcement the resources that are necessary for doing that. That’s a real shame, and it’s Donald Trump that is defunding the police. It is not the state of Illinois. It’s not the city of Chicago. It’s Donald Trump doing that.
* August 23…
Donald Trump's threat to bring the National Guard to Chicago isn't about safety — it's a test of the limits of his power and a trial run for a police state.
Illinois has long worked with federal law enforcement to tackle crime, but we won't let a dictator impose his will. pic.twitter.com/hmr0BSKCBf
— Governor JB Pritzker (@GovPritzker) August 23, 2025
posted by Isabel Miller
Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 11:28 am
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The Tribune should be ashamed. Leave Emma out of this.
Comment by Springfielder Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 11:32 am
Crime is just the pretext Trump is using, if it wasn’t that, it’d be some other reason he’s wanting to send ICE and National Guard into Chicago.
It’s not a good faith debate and the Tribune is being ignorant here, perhaps willfully.
Comment by ChicagoVinny Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 11:36 am
The Chicago Tribune Editorial Board writing something in bad faith while cowardly refusing to sign any of their members’ names to the writing? Well gosh, now I’ve heard everything.
Comment by Roadrager Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 11:36 am
Both sides of this issue constantly try to personalize the issue with specific incidents and names to promote their own purposes.
Should not be done.
Comment by Mason County Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 11:40 am
- Mason County - Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 11:40 am:
Any evidence for your statement?
Comment by Precinct Captain Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 11:55 am
Team Pritzker needs to adjust their political weather vane on crime. Americans are right of center on it.
Comment by Here Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 11:57 am
The Rauner cheerleaders are now Trump cheerleaders.
Comment by Big Dipper Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 11:59 am
The Tribune editorial board correctly identifies that Noem is politically cynical, writing that “Noem claimed that Illinois policies barred state or local authorities from assisting the feds in capturing the accused. That was false: Illinois authorities worked with the U.S. Marshals Service to arrest and charge the suspect.” Despite this, they invent that the Governor is refusing cooperation between state and feds in tracking down violent offenders, later writing “And his comments about how Chicago and Illinois don’t need federal help to fight crime were always ill-advised”. They wrote these two statements in the same opinion piece!
If the tribune editorial board is so committed to both-sides logic for every possible opinion as the highest good in editorializing, in some cases this leads to just inventing ‘facts’ out of thin air for the sake of their argument.
Comment by Incandenza Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 12:04 pm
Pity the poor (well, not literally) Trib Ed Board members, who thought they had really hooked into the administration’s wavelength by using Emma Shafer as a prop. Unfortunately for them, Kristi has moved on and is now exploiting the memory of Katie Abraham instead, no doubt because her parents are more cooperative and her dad has put himself out there as a “they just let anybody into this country nowadays” kind of guy in interviews.
https://x.com/DHSgov/status/1965082306177122404
Also, they’re using a crash in Urbana to justify immigration raids in Chicago. Guess DOGE took all the maps out of Homeland Security in the name of efficiency.
Comment by Roadrager Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 12:18 pm
=== Team Pritzker needs to adjust their political weather vane on crime. ===
Pritzker has not said anything about wanting to be lax on crime so I am not quite sure about what changes you think he needs to make. The stuff coming from Trump and his cult about crime is neither helpful or based in reality.
To my knowledge, Pritzker has acknowledged that more needs to be done about crime - including restoring the violence prevention funding that Trump and his congressional allies have eliminated. What Pritzker needs to do is communicate about what has been done to reduce crime, what other initiatives can be implemented to reduce crime, and back up his ideas with data.
Pritzker also needs to show why the extremist actions of Trump are not going to reduce crime and that he is just gaslighting us all.
Comment by Remember the Alamo II Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 12:21 pm
-Team Pritzker needs to adjust their political weather vane on crime-
Illinois voters don’t care about crime. Look at the people who make it to being a judge in places like Cook County. Pritzker really doesn’t have to change what he’s doing.
Comment by Steve Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 12:23 pm
@ Here
=== Team Pritzker needs to adjust their political weather vane on crime ===
I am not sure what you are hearing or reading, but it clearly is not what is being said. Pritzker has continuously requested federal help and federal funding to create intervention strategies that have been shown to reduce crime. Indeed, if you read the full post here, you see him doing exactly want you suggest he needs to do, but which you suggest he is not doing. Perhaps your political biases are blinding you to facts and truths.
Comment by H-W Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 12:28 pm
I’m going to state the good first: I do believe that the Governor has worked on the crime issue in ways that the public don’t know about or appreciate.
I did not myself appreciate some of the crime prevention strategies, possibly because they are very Chicago centric.
What changed my mind was several episodes of a podcast called People I Mostly Admire hosted by the excellent University of Chicago economist Steven Levette.
April 25 episode: A Solution To Today’s Crime Problem. Jens Ludwig (also) an economist and the director of the University of Chicago Crime Lab.”
The July 25 episode is Arne Duncan. He also talks crime reduction in the city of Chicago. The guy walks the walk and is doing the work.
I know it is probably not normally acceptable to be recommending a podcast in this space but this podcast hits me very close to home and has opened my mind to other possibilities when it comes to dealing with crime.
Now the bad- Governor Pritzker should be very careful with getting in a back and forth with trump. Or he should at least be very careful with how he does it. Many people, and not all of them republicans, take this back and forth as the governor not taking the public seriously when they legitimately voice concerns about crime. Whether it is true or not, the perception of many uninformed voters is that this governor has more concern for criminals than the law abiding public.
I don’t know how he fixes this. I have not watched a single moment of Fox News in many years, but I still hear the “soft on crime” undercurrent here in the Quad Cities news market where they draw a comparison between the laws in Iowa and the laws in Illinois.
As the Governor, I suggest two things. First, get foid out of the state police. That perception that the state police is somehow in opposition to legal gun owners and thereby against the law abiding public causes the crazies to make all kinds of statements connecting the state police to their perceived “gun grabbing whims of the Governor” etc which is hogwash of course. Still- disconnect those issues. The second is to beef up the state police. The Governor can make statements about adding police, but he doesn’t do it with the agency that he has the most influence on. I personally think the Governor is aware of the good work the state police has done and even mentioned it in a speech recently. He should increase headcount in a way that the public will see with their own eyes, especially in rural areas where the state police could make an impact and increase the professionalism of area law enforcement.
Comment by Occasionally Moderated Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 12:37 pm
@ Here Trump is underwater on crime, so seems like Team Pritzker’s read is going pretty well.
Comment by Nerd Herddddd Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 12:43 pm
===The Governor can make statements about adding police, but he doesn’t do it with the agency that he has the most influence on===
Since 2019, 597 troopers have joined ISP.
https://isp.illinois.gov/Media/PressReleaseFile/2151
Comment by Rich Miller Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 1:01 pm
I’m shocked, shocked to find out the Editorial Board published a logically bankrupt piece.
Comment by Panther Pride Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 1:04 pm
We all know the saying that “If it bleeds it leads,” and how it rules local news. The thing is, that creates confirmation bias about crime always being rising despite fairly term declines. At some point, the staid editorial board of the Trib ought to try to inform readers instead of giving into their confirmation bias every time there is any violence.
Comment by ArchPundit Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 1:33 pm
=== like Chicago CRED for example, the work they do in the communities has brought down crime by 73 percent in the toughest neighborhoods across the city of Chicago. ===
Not to pick on Arne Duncan, but this statement is not true.
The Northwestern study of CRED was not a double-blind study. The researchers noted several problems, most importantly that the participants in the study were literally handpicked by the staff. In addition, the study relies upon Chicago police data, which the researchers note is wrong over half the time.
What the researchers did conclude is that program participants that completed a two year program were 73% less likely to have been re-arrested for a violent crime compared to someone their age from the same geographic area.
But only 111 of the initial 324 enrollees completed the two years.
So, did CRED reduce violent criminal behavior by 73% for people who stayed in the 2-year program because of its programming?
Or did gang involvement reduce participation in CRED by 66% (from 324 to 111), leaving only “Good Apples” in the program?
We don’t know.
https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2300327120
Comment by Rumple Stiltskin Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 1:38 pm
==We all know the saying that “If it bleeds it leads,” and how it rules local news. The thing is, that creates confirmation bias about crime always being rising despite fairly term declines.==
The unspoken corollary that has developed is “And if it’s not bleeding now, talk about how it used to in the present tense.”
Comment by Roadrager Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 1:58 pm
Rich the number of uniformed troopers assigned to patrol or uniform field duties are at historical lows. The actual headcount was fairly consistent from 1970 to 2022 from what I could find online. The state police annual report for 2024 does not mention headcount as far as I could see.
I think the story is the many additional and meaningful duties the state police has accumulated over the years. Each additional duty has resulted in less troopers in the field. If you gloss through the annual report you can see what I mean.
https://isp.illinois.gov/StaticFiles/docs/Directors/LegislationNPublicNotice/annrpt2024.pdf
I truly believe that Gov. Pritzger knows well what the state police is doing well and appreciates their contribution more than any gov since perhaps Big Jim. And this is one way that I can see that he can flip the script.
Comment by Occasionally Moderated Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 2:09 pm
This tripe is not surprising considering it came from the same editorial board that suggested Chicago would be better off if there some natural disaster like Katrina or Sandy to wipe everything out and start over.
Comment by CA-HOON Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 2:11 pm
When crimes numbers are high they scream. When crime numbers are low they say they are fake or that low numbers don’t matter because even one murder is too many. These are not intellectually honest people.
Comment by Big Dipper Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 2:14 pm
=The actual headcount was fairly consistent from 1970 to 2022 from what I could find online.=
The numbers started to decline in the early 2000’s when retirements were not replaced. Looong before JB was governor.
Comment by JS Mill Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 2:24 pm
The Trib editorial goes further along the path to meaninglessness. While Pres. Felon started the disintigration of civil political discourse it is absurd to cast Felon and JB as equally responsible.
Comment by old guy Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 3:14 pm
=He should increase headcount in a way that the public will see with their own eyes, especially in rural areas where the state police could make an impact and increase the professionalism of area law enforcement He should increase headcount in a way that the public will see with their own eyes, especially in rural areas.where the state police could make an impact and increase the professionalism of area law enforcement.=
Or perhaps, if we don’t want to pay attention to what’s really occurring, the problem isn’t the governor’s at all. You do underscore a very valid and problematic issue. Good work often goes unnoticed as we become more isolated from facts and the truth.
Comment by Pundent Monday, Sep 8, 25 @ 4:24 pm