‘Election emergency’? Journalist Aaron Parnas says President Trump’s laying the groundwork for a declaration that would give his team unprecedented authority over who votes—and how.
■ Law professor Joyce Vance sees the administration escalating “its transparent efforts to manipulate the election this year in its favor.”
■ Time: What to know about new Postal Service rules for mail-in ballots.
■ Columnist and former Illinois Democratic U.S. Rep. Marie Newman: Novelists saw what was coming.
Trump’s ‘deranged’ 1 a.m. posting spree. The Daily Beast (free link): “Fresh off a day at the Freedom 250 Grand Prix of Washington, with all eyes on him, his obsessive aide Natalie Harp and his lesser-spotted wife, Melania Trump,” the president “flooded his Truth Social account with … artificial intelligence slop.”
■ The Washington Post: Doctors are flagging Trump’s big weight gain.
‘They were keeping it from you on purpose.’ Columnist and former Illinois Republican U.S. Rep. Adam Kinzinger says the D.C. press corps has long known about the disturbingly close relationship between Trump and Harp.
■ Poynter media writer Tom Jones: Reporters have new cause to focus on Harp.
■ Chicagoan and author Elaine Soloway spins a yarn: “Natalia Harpinsky Returns to the Soviet Union.”
‘The Moose That Roared.’ Nobel-winning economist Paul Krugman says Trump’s destined to lose his trade war with Canada.
■ Traditional conservative turned Never-Trumper Charlie Sykes: “If you did not have a bitter, mutually destructive war with our friend and ally to the North on your bingo card, you are not alone.”
■ Ontario’s premier is threatening to cut off the electricity it sends the U.S.
‘Why the hell is Hakeem Jeffries meeting with Prince Jared of Trump?’ Wonkette’s Evan Hurst wonders whether the House Democratic leader “actually understands that we are fighting fascism.”
■ Adam Kinzinger begs someone to “make this make sense.”
■ The AP sees the meeting as “a signal that the White House is seeking ways to work with Democrats if they wrest majority control from Republicans in the midterm elections.”
Hell of an August. A Tribune editorial (free link) demands that Indiana political leaders and the NIPSCO electric utility begin an honest discussion about how gobsmackingly long the storm-triggered power outage has lasted …
■ … much of it documented in a Sun-Times series, “Powerless” …
■ … whose latest installment explains that “every day is a struggle for a family of seven.”
■ A lawsuit accuses NIPSCO of failing to protect its power lines from tree damage—despite customers’ complaints.
Killer cop dead. The former Sangamon County sheriff’s deputy serving a 20-year sentence for killing a Springfield-area woman in her home after threatening to shoot her “in the f______ face” has died in prison.
■ CWB Chicago: The Chicago cop with more misconduct complaints than any other active staffer has been jailed on domestic battery charges.
■ Triton College board chair Mark Stephens—son of one Rosemont mayor and brother of another—has been arrested on drug charges.
■ Triton College board chair Mark Stephens—son of one Rosemont mayor and brother of another—has been arrested on drug charges.
‘Terrifying.’ Add the American Civil Liberties Union to the roster of those alarmed by administration plans to arm—um, hand?—Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers with gloves capable of delivering electric shocks.
■ A story you might not have expected on the Fox News website: During her concert tour’s opening night in Chicago, country singer Kacey Musgraves encouraged fans to help kids whose parents have been deported.
‘I won … against The Washington Post.’ Columnist Karen Attiah says she was fired last year “for speaking the truth in the wake of the Charlie Kirk killing” …
■ … but now a private arbitrator has ordered the Jeff Bezos-owned newspaper to rehire her (New York Times gift link).
■ Two of those responsible for her firing are already gone.
■ News watchdog and former New York Times public editor Margaret Sullivan: “Polls, pundits and horserace coverage are NOT what we need for the midterms. What if the media were to get obsessed about things that really matter?”
Sub fatigue. John Oliver’s target last night: The proliferation of unwanted and nigh-uncancellable subscriptions for everything from car software to printer ink—a problem that he says is fixable with a simple “Cancel” button, “so I’d argue that companies should give us that fucking button.”
■ Oliver also embarrassed Trump Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy over Duffy’s “godawful” reality show—underwritten by companies Duffy’s department is supposed to regulate.
■ MS NOW: Even Republicans are getting mad about Trump’s budget director “going rogue on federal spending.”
‘Trump plans to silence CNN, Jon Stewart and John Oliver (the same way he silenced CBS News).’ Former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich warns that “Trump buddy Larry Ellison … and his son David are a hair’s breadth away from being able to decide what many Americans learn about what Trump is doing to America.”
■ The Atlantic (gift link): “Trump comedians are tired.”
■ Stephen Colbert’s back—with a beard: “Give my best to TV. I miss it.”
‘I quite like most of your usual staple, but I find Jeff Tiedrich kind of shrill and on-the-nose.’ A Chicago Public Square reader—and former Tribune colleague—isn’t wild about Everyone is entitled to my own opinion proprietor Tiedrich’s plainspoken columns. But that reader goes on to concede, “Maybe it’s useful in shaping the newsletter to have someone who just says the thing, instead of being subtle about it?”
■ Other Square readers—including some related to this newsletter’s publisher—have raised the same concern, but consider:
■ Square’s not about clicks for clicks’ sake. If it were, every headline would look like the April 1, 2022, edition or frequently feature the headline “Someone you know is dead” (2005 link). But the fact that readers—repeatedly advised that Tiedrich is “typically unrestrained”—keep clicking suggests they find value in his “on-the-nose” ability to be “someone who just says the thing.” Especially in the age of Trump, that’s no trifle.
■ Not every item in Square will appeal to every reader; one of the virtues of this compressed news roundup is your ability to click what interests you and ignore the rest.
■ So feel free to ignore this end-of-issue link to Tiedrich’s latest: “No one gives a shit about your Grand Prix race, you out-of-touch fuck.”