Lynch sob. In a tweet, President Trump compared the impeachment process to “a lynching.”
■ Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington has launched a continually updated Trump Conflict Tracker, tallying the president’s conflicts of interest since taking office.
■ A Michigan congressman who quit the Republican Party to become an independent says his former Republican colleagues “wish they weren’t, you know, trapped.”
■ A whole bunch of Democrats are jockeying to replace the late Rep. Elijah Cummings and lead the impeachment investigation.
■ Former President Jimmy Carter’s in the hospital after fracturing his pelvis in what was at least his third fall in recent months.
‘Even getting caught is a win for the Russians.’ CNN’s Donie O’Sullivan writes (in the Reliable Sources newsletter) that Facebook’s takedown of troll accounts “adds to America’s national paranoia. … How are we supposed to trust anything when anything could be a Russian?”
■ Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has been quietly helping Pete Buttigieg’s presidential campaign.
Elizabeth Warren’s taking sides. She was set to join striking Chicago teachers on the picket line today.
■ Block Club Chicago and Chalkbeat are updating developments continually.
Your tax dollars at work. Cook County’s inspector general is flagging fat raises handed to nine Cook County Health employees without proper approval.
■ A new report from the Civic Federation tax watchdog group (PDF download) finds Chicago’s relatively low taxes on homes dramatically undercut those of many suburbs … but the city’s catching up.
■ Mayor Lightfoot is trumpeting her version of a “Marshall Plan”—heavy investment to redevelop some of Chicago’s most challenged neighborhoods.
‘He wants to know what arson is, your honor.’ The lawyer for a 9-year-old boy accused of murder in a fire that killed five people had to translate as the judge explained the charges to the kid.
■ A man caught on video in a drunken rant against a woman wearing a Puerto Rican T-shirt in a Cook County Forest Preserve last year has been sentenced to probation and community service—but will avoid jail.
■ A police officer who stood by and did nothing during the rant quit last year.
■ Chicago’s top cop, Eddie Johnson, says he doesn’t plan to quit—despite his health problems and having been found asleep in a car last week.
NBC: Sorry about not reporting that tornado. NBC-owned Dallas TV station KXAS is apologizing for waiting six minutes to interrupt a Cowboys football game with a warning of the tornado that ravaged the city Sunday night.
■ In the midst of controversy over his role in suppression of reporting on sexual harassment charges against movie producer Harvey Weinstein, NBC News President Noah Oppenheim reportedly got a new contract.
Unrelated developments.
■ A new study from the nonpartisan Public Religion Research Institute finds religion at the heart of the nation’s partisan divide—and casts doubt on Trump’s strategy of squeezing greater support from shrinking groups.
■ The warming climate is turning almost all newborn baby sea turtles female.
Clarification. Yesterday’s edition of Chicago Public Square muddled a mention of who’ll need a new Real ID driver’s license or ID card to get on a domestic flight next year. You can keep your existing card if you instead choose to present a valid U.S. passport or passport card. Thanks to readers Mike Weiland, Pam Spiegel and John McClelland for helping set things straight.
