Try, try again. His previous indictment kneecapped by a Supreme Court opinion equating presidents with kings, special counsel Jack Smith’s filed a revised, narrower set of (the same) criminal charges against Donald Trump.
■ Law Dork Chris Geidner calls it an attempt to “immunity-proof” Smith’s Jan. 6 Trump indictment.
■ Charlie Pierce at Esquire: “Smith has evidently had enough of seeing Judge Aileen Cannon’s Trump-sized thumb on the scale down in Florida.”
■ Read the new indictment. (It’s just 36 pages!)
■ Law prof Joyce Vance’s line-by-line comparison of the original and revised charges reveals “there is no more reference to the 45th President of the United States. The indictment is now about Donald Trump.”
■ CNN: The revision underscores “the huge personal stake that Trump has in winning in November and reacquiring the executive authority that would allow him to end federal proceedings against him.”
■ The American Prospect’s Rick Perlstein talks to an expert on far-right extremism about “the election story nobody wants to talk about”: What happens if Trump wins—or loses.
■ The Bulwark explores “Trump’s latest grift.”
■ The Democratic ticket, Kamala Harris and Tim Walz, will grant CNN their first joint interview tomorrow night.
■ Daily Beast columnist—and actor/comedian—Michael Ian Black ponders “just how bonkers will the Harris-Trump debate actually be?”
■ USA Today’s Rex Huppke offers Trump “10 very specific demands for a debate.”
■ The Reader’s Ben Joravsky: “We’ve reached that funny phase of the election season where Democrats invent new explanations for why they will lose.”
‘The delegates from COVID-19 cast their votes for … uggh.’ Last week’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago was, if not a super-spreader event, at least a big spreader event for the virus …
■ … one of whose victims, Trump niece Mary L. Trump, files a column despite “COVID brain, so focusing is a little difficult.”
Suck it, 1973. Chicago broke your Aug. 27 heat record.
■ The storms that followed ravaged some suburbs.
Freed from journalism. Demolition of the Tribune’s Freedom Center publishing plant has begun—to make room for a casino.
■ Block Club Chicago: “Downtown newspaper racks removed by city ahead of DNC, with no plans to bring them back.”
■ A catchy new Schoolhouse Rock-style cartoon song reminds people that “the free press isn’t free.”
■ The Onion: “Woman Wastes Free Monthly Cincinnati.com Article On Story About High School Golf Team.”■ It’s not just journalism: Columnist Anne Helen Petersen asks you to guess what private equity is doing to childcare—what happens when you try to “maximize profit” in a daycare center.
‘An ignominious distinction.’ Urban planners are sounding an alarm about Greyhound’s pending eviction from its downtown station—which would make Chicago the largest Northern Hemisphere city without an intercity bus terminal.
■ Surprise! The station’s owned by an affiliate of the vampiric hedge fund (2020 link) that owns the Tribune and that sold Freedom Center.
‘Almost to a person, they said they had canceled months ago.’ Cartoonist/columnist (cartolomnist?) Jack Ohman surveyed his friends about a New York Times piece headlined “Trump Can Win on Character.”
■ Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Will Bunch: “Critics begged the media to rise to the occasion of the 2024 election, but it’s hitting new lows.”
‘Underconsumption core.’ The Trib explores a viral trend pushing back against a culture of consumerism …
■ … a trend your Chicago Public Square columnist has embraced.
■ As Mariano’s parent Kroger and Jewel parent Albertsons defend their right to merge, The Lever says they’re “doing everything they can to bypass regulators and merge into a price-gouging behemoth.”
■ Add Lowe’s to the list of companies retreating on corporate diversity efforts.
■ A political movement gaining steam: YIMBY—“Yes, In My Backyard”—for more homes, more apartments to address the nation’s housing shortage.
Mark Zuckerberg’s ‘pitiful behavior.’ News media monitor Oliver Darcy calls out the Facebook founder’s decision to “bend the knee to dishonest politicians” …
■ … with a letter to Republican House Judiciary Committee chair Jim Jordan blaming the Biden administration for pressuring his company to crack down on COVID lies in 2021.
■ Wired: The president of messaging app company Signal “wants to remind you that the world’s most secure communications platform is a nonprofit. It’s free. It doesn’t track you or serve you ads.”
Corrections’ silver lining. Hope you caught yesterday’s corrected Square, fixing an erroneous identification for columnist Dan Pfeiffer.
■ Thanks to the first to report the mistake, Charlie Pajor …
■ … and to the many (many, many) others who followed, several of whom nevertheless included kind praise for this service:
■ “I love your newsletter. …You have a way of writing headlines that are irresistible. Thank you for all the work you do. I look forward to 10 a.m. each morning.”
■ “Love what you do.”
■ “Great job, as usual.”
■ You can help keep those errors coming for as little as $1, once.
■ Mike Gold and Mike Braden made this edition better.