Free Republic

Despite President Donald Trump’s decision to federalize the Washington D.C. police force and deploy the National Guard to fight violent crime in the nation’s capital, he cannot deliver on his threat to do the same in Chicago, state and local officials said Monday. “If we need to, we’re going to do the same thing in Chicago, which is a disaster. We have a man there who’s totally incompetent. He’s an incompetent man,” Trump said, referring to Mayor Brandon Johnson. “And we have an incompetent governor there. Pritzker is an incompetent,” Trump added, referring to Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker. And now...

Newly appointed Chicago Park District Supt. Carlos Ramirez-Rosa issued a statement saying the temporary art would “celebrate Chicago’s diverse communities” in a proposed “Peoples’ Plaza.” The new plaza is expected to open in late summer or early fall after pavement restoration. Ron Onesti, president of the Joint Civic Committee of Italian Americans, viewed the move as a betrayal of the innovative agreement he cut with Mayor Brandon Johnson’s administration nearly three months ago. The deal called for the Columbus statue in Arrigo Park to be “loaned” to the civic committee for display in a new Chicago Museum of Italian Immigration...

Mayor Lori Lightfoot and a group of City Council members urged Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx Monday to reconsider prosecuting five suspects in a deadly gang-related shootout last week in Austin after they were released when prosecutors rejected charges against them. Chicago police sought to charge all five suspects with murder and aggravated battery after they allegedly engaged in a Friday morning gunfight between two factions of the Four Corner Hustlers street gang, the Chicago Sun-Times first reported. The state’s attorney’s office, however, declined to charge any of them, calling the evidence insufficient. A police report further noted that...

Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Wednesday she’s “very disappointed” in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for fanning the flames of fear about the spread of the coronavirus in the United States. Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, is warning Americans to start preparing now for “the expectation that this might be bad,” triggering a severe disruption in their daily lives. That may require what she called, “social distancing measures” that include smaller classes or closing schools, canceling meetings and conferences and allowing employees to work from home. Lightfoot essentially accused the federal...