Trump’s got it. Here’s your “October surprise”: President Trump and his wife have tested positive for COVID-19 …
■ … and he has what a White House staffer calls “mild symptoms.”
■ The Atlantic’s Alexis C. Madrigal: “Trump was never going to protect the country from the virus. But ultimately he could not even protect himself.”
■ … but Vice President and Mrs. Pence have reportedly tested negative.
■ … including his debate opponent, Joe Biden, who’s tweeted out prayers “for the health and safety of the president and his family.”
■ Poynter’s Tom Jones: How the media covered the breaking and stunning news.
‘Top advisers’ who had apparently been paying no attention to science. The New York Times reports that “top advisers to the president described themselves as in a state of shock.”
■ The Guardian: This changes everything.
■ Historian Heather Cox Richardson notes cause for skepticism: “Someone had suggested this very scenario back in September as a way for Trump to steal headlines away from Biden, emerge victorious over the virus, and claim credit for a new treatment that had cured him” …
■ … but if it is a scam, the Trump campaign wasn’t in on it—based on email sent at 10:24 p.m. Thursday and 6:48 a.m. Friday.
■ A Democratic strategist tells Politico it’s the Trump campaign’s “worst nightmare.”
■ It tosses into disarray plans for two Trump rallies in Wisconsin Saturday.
Schadenfreude on Twitter. “Looks like RBG successfully argued her first case before God.”
‘Exhilarating.’ That’s how one voter—a friend and former neighbor of your Chicago Public Square proprietor, as it turns out—described for the Sun-Times the experience of casting a ballot on the first day of Chicago’s early in-person voting.
■ Two “notorious conservative operatives” face felony charges in connection with coordinating robocalls to suppress votes in Illinois and other states.
■ Dueling takes on the “Fair Tax Amendment” on the ballot—from the Tribune’s Eric Zorn and the Illinois Policy Institute’s Austin Berg.
Judge quits. Avoiding discipline—and rejection by voters in his bid to be retained—a Cook County judge accused of inappropriate and harassing behavior toward women is resigning.
■ All those judges on the ballot* deserve your thoughtful vote. VoteforJudges.org sums up bar associations’ evaluations.
Going somewhere? Consumer Reports offers COVID safety tips for going places—whether by plane, train, bus or automobile.
■ Amazon reports that, since March 1, at least 20,000 of its workers have tested or been presumed positive for COVID-19.
■ Donning a new cap, “Mr. COVID Answer Man,” the Sun-Times’ Neil Steinberg serves up sarcastic answers to profound questions: “Part of wishing for the future is the assumption that things will be better then. No reason for that. Remember, life might also get worse.”
Chicago’s Halloweek. Dressed in costume, Mayor Lightfoot spelled out the city’s guidelines for celebrating Halloween.
■ Christkindlmarket is canceled in Chicago for the first time since 1996.
Saturday Night Live—really. NBC is going to bring an in-studio audience back for this weekend’s season premiere …
■ … which features Jim Carrey as Joe Biden.
■ If you want to see Jacob Marley’s Christmas Carol on stage this year, you’re headed to Milwaukee.
■ Here’s a roundup of the Chicago insults in a new Netflix series, Emily in Paris.
Thanks to Chris Koenig and your Square publisher’s future daughter-in-law Molly Coleman for making this edition more interesting, and to Pam Spiegel for making it more typographically respectable.
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* One of whom is married to your Square publisher.