Illinois U.S. Sen. Tammy Duckworth said this morning she’s talking with President-elect Joe Biden’s team as he prepares to take the White House. During an interview on MSNBC the Hoffman Estates Democrat — at one point a contender to be Biden’s running mate and now being floated as a possibility for a cabinet post — was asked whether she had gotten a job offer.
Duckworth said “no” and chuckled. The Army combat veteran and member of the Senate Armed Services Committee also expressed concerns about military moves President Donald Trump is reportedly entertaining just months before he leaves office.
Just ahead of the busiest shopping season of the year, meanwhile, Gov. J.B. Pritzker announced new COVID-19 restrictions on the number of shoppers allowed in retail stores. He’s also shuttering casinos and museums as part of a larger effort to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
The news comes as Chicago Public Schools announced students and teachers would return to the classroom in January.
Pritzker also got personal today during his COVID-19 news briefing, saying his family will be in separate locations for Thanksgiving — he and his son in Chicago, his wife and daughter in Florida. He’s staying put because COVID-19 is surging and he feels a duty to be here, but his wife and high school-age daughter will remain in the Sunshine State indefinitely after the younger Pritzker “came under attack” on social media.
And my Tribune colleague Michael Hawthorne has a piece about Chicago scrambling to catch up to other cities forecasting COVID-19 outbreaks by analyzing human waste flushed down thousands of toilets. The city’s labyrinth of sewers is divided between two bosses: the Chicago Department of Water Management and the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District, two agencies with a history of bureaucratic turf wars and a reputation for blaming each other when the system fails, he reminds.
Welcome to The Spin.
Duckworth: Trump ‘ wants to blow everything up’ as he exits
Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth, a combat veteran, said her take on reports that President Donald Trump has considered drawing down troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, and was talked out of a military strike on Iran is evidence he “wants to blow everything up as he goes out the door.”
Duckworth made the remarks this morning on MSNBC when she was asked about the moves.
The Associated Press reported that U.S. officials said Trump is expected to cut a significant number of U.S. troops in Afghanistan and a smaller number in Iraq by the final days of his presidency. The plan would run counter to military commanders’ advice over the past year, while still falling short of Trump’s much-touted goal to end America’s long wars, the AP notes. And the expected plans would leave 2,500 troops in both Iraq and Afghanistan, meaning that President-elect Joe Biden would be the fourth president to grapple with the still-smoldering conflicts launched in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
Duckworth, who lost both her legs when her Army helicopter was shot down in Iraq, said it’s clear to her why Trump “hollowed out” the top levels of the Pentagon in recent weeks and installed a new slate of loyalists he thought might go along with him.
Duckworth, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said there’s not much Congress can do to stop the president’s order to withdraw troops, but warned: “This is a really dangerous decision the president has made.” She said the armed forces would be professional to the end, but that a hasty exit could mean that “caches of equipment” may be left behind — and end up in the hands of enemies.
The senator said she’s not surprised that Trump advisers successfully talked the president out of a military strike on Iran to halt its nuclear program, as The New York Times reported.
“I would expect nothing less because it would be malpractice on their part,” Duckworth said of those who were able to push back on a missile or cyberstrike. “This president literally wants to blow everything up as he goes out the door.” She blames Trump for dissolving the U.S.-Iran nuclear deal lifting restrictions that then allowed the country to pursue the very nuclear program the president wants to strike down.
Oh, and about those discussions with President-elect Biden: Duckworth said she is talking to him about COVID-19 response and national security issues as he prepares to take office. But Biden hasn’t offered Duckworth a job in his cabinet, Duckworth said.
Valerie Jarrett, a former senior adviser to President Barack Obama, was asked today on MSNBC whether she would be interested in an appointment to fill the remainder of Duckworth’s term in the Senate if she gets a job in the Biden cabinet.
Jarrett replied: “Ah, no. And I will tell you why: I have devoted most of my life to service and I will continue to do that. I had the best job in the world for eight years. President Obama said to me, ‘You will much rather serve in the White House than serve in the Senate. I know you and I know the Senate, and so come with me.’ I’m sure glad that I did. And at this chapter of my life, I’m looking forward to service from the outside.”
Gov. J.B. Pritzker gets personal: His family will spend Thanksgiving apart
Yesterday, the governor seemed to get coy about his Thanksgiving plans. A Chicago resident, he was asked whether he would abide by Mayor Lightfoot’s travel advisory. He initially said he didn’t know the details of the advisory, which asks but does not mandate Chicagoans to forgo nonessential travel.
He was asked whether he’d stay in Chicago, and answered: “That is my hope, but I will let you know.”
Today Pritzker firmed it up, saying “I will be celebrating Thanksgiving in Chicago with our son,” explaining that “I believe that the situation is simply too grave for me to be elsewhere.”
He attributed his vague response 24 hours earlier to being “taken aback by (a) question about my family’s holiday plans, in part because my wife and I were in the process of making the very hard decision that we may need to celebrate Thanksgiving apart from one another for the first time ever. And it was weighing heavily on my mind.”
The governor then shared more: His daughter, he said, came “under attack” on social media last week. And he believes it was all about getting back at him over COVID-19 restrictions.
A picture of a group of people eating outside a Chicago restaurant apparently in violation of COVID-19 restrictions was posted on what he called a “parody Twitter account.” The person who posted the photo claimed one of the people in the shot was the governor’s daughter and it began to circulate on Twitter.
Soon enough, the Democratic governor said, it was also shared by Republican elected officials, along with “a network of propaganda publications in the state and some radio shock jocks from telling people that the picture was of my daughter, despite knowing that this was a lie.” In turn, “a slew of strangers … sent hateful, threatening messages to my daughter over the subsequent few days.”
But there was more, the governor said: “(A) well-known lawyer who cares more about headlines than winning his cases posted a bounty on his Facebook page, offering money to harass my family at Thanksgiving. An actual cash bounty. Including my kids — harassing them. My high school-aged kids. Put yourself in the shoes of a high school girl who is being weaponized against her father by his political opponents. Weaponized with lies. Put yourself in my shoes. We have threats that stream into my office daily while we have watched the kidnapping plot unfold against the Michigan governor, just a state away. I’m the governor, I was elected to this job and while I don’t think it should come with a fear for my health and safety, I accept that sometimes it does.”
The governor asked that his privacy be respected, that COVID-19 restrictions should be a “political fight. This is a fight to save peoples’ lives” and asked that we all remember that, particularly during the holiday season.
Sign up for The Spin to get the top stories in politics delivered to your inbox weekday afternoons.
From the Tribune’s Dan Petrella, Jamie Munks and Gregory Pratt: Gov. Pritzker today announced targeted restrictions for retail shops and a shutdown of casinos as part of the state’s latest effort to slow the surging coronavirus. It’s a return to statewide restrictions enacted earlier this year when the state reached a critical tipping point.
They write: “Just ahead of the busiest shopping season of the year, retailers will be under a 25% capacity limit, down from the current 50%. A 50% capacity limit will remain for grocery stores, but big-box chains such as Walmart and Target that include groceries will be subject to the lower limit.” Read the full story here.
Closings: Casinos and video gambling terminals statewide will be shut down under the plan. Likewise, museums will be closed, my Tribune colleague Steve Johnson reports. The new measures take effect at midnight Friday. Meantime, the Tribune’s John Byrne has a piece about the city’s COVID-19 travel list as the city’s top public health officer urges people to forgo traditional Thanksgiving plans with people from different households.
The governor’s urging patience after some good news on the vaccine front this week.
Chicago Public Schools teachers, staff students return to the classroom in January, the Tribune’s Karen Ann Cullotta reports. It comes as more suburban districts revert to remote learning. Read the full story here.
College students are urged to get a COVID-19 test before heading home for the holidays, but even a negative result doesn’t mean they won’t spread virus the Tribune’s Elyssa Cherney writes.
U-46 students will return to remote learning as COVID-19 cases keep rising in Kane County, Karie Angell Luc reports in The Courier-News.
The biggest worry, officials said this week, is that hospitals are filling up. The Tribune’s Jamie Munks wrote yesterday that Illinois had 5,581 people hospitalized for the coronavirus as of Sunday night — a nearly two-thirds increase over the 3,371 reported Nov. 1.
The state also has surged past its spring peak set April 28, when 5,037 people were in the hospital for COVID-19.
The number of COVID-19 patients in intensive care is up 58% since Nov. 1, and the number on ventilators is up 72%.
Hospitals are returning to spring strategies, including limiting elective surgeries and adding more beds, Munks notes.
Workers threaten to strike at 11 nursing homes in Illinois next week if wages and pandemic hazard pay don’t increase, the Tribune’s Robert McCoppin reports. Most of the homes are in the Chicago area and most of the employees are women, many of them Black or Latino — two of the hardest hit communities in the pandemic.
Related: Proposal to cap delivery app fees in Chicago clears City Council hurdle, the Tribune’s Gregory Pratt reports.
City encourages residents this holiday season to shop at Black businesses hit hard by pandemic
From the Tribune’s Lauren Zumbach: The city is encouraging Chicagoans to support Black-owned businesses on Black Friday, the traditional kickoff to the holiday shopping season, with a website promoting more than 500 local businesses.
The initiative, called “Black Shop Friday,” includes a directory of Black-owned businesses by the type of products sold and neighborhood. The website, www.BlackShopFriday.com, is scheduled to launch Nov. 24, three days before Black Friday.
The coronavirus pandemic has made 2020 challenging for all small businesses, but it’s been especially tough for Black-owned businesses, which tend to have more limited access to capital, said Karen Freeman-Wilson, president and CEO of the Chicago Urban League. Read more here.
Aretha Franklin, Bob Dylan, Beyonce, Jay-Z: Obama releases Spotify list
Hat tip to the Tribune’s Ray Long: Former President Barack Obama, who cut his political teeth in Chicago and whose family still owns a home here, is really hawking that new memoir “A Promised Land.” Today, he shared with followers a dozen musical selections via Spotify to accompany the long read and a note: “Hey there. My memoir, A Promised Land, is out today. I put together this playlist for you to listen to featuring some memorable songs from my administration. Hope you enjoy it.”
The playlist nods to the highest highs and the lowest lows (Aretha Franklin’s “The Weight” U2’s “Beautiful Day” and Jay-Z’s “My First Song”) only a few men — and one day a woman — must feel being the leader of the free world.
Education news: Claims of anti-Semitism at University of Illinois, state’s largest public university, prompt federal investigation by Department of Education, the Tribune’s Elyssa Cherney reports.
More than 10,000 times in a single year, Illinois schools put children into seclusion, latest federal data shows: “Over the last year, in response to a November 2019 investigation by the Chicago Tribune and ProPublica Illinois, the state took several actions to discourage schools from relying on seclusion and physical restraint in response to difficult student behavior,” Jennifer Smith Richards and Jodi S. Cohen report. “But advocates for students with disabilities say the most recent data offers evidence that the new restrictions need to be enforced and that stronger steps are needed.”
An Illinois bill that would ban prone physical restraint and place more restrictions on schools that use isolated timeout is headed for consideration in the legislative veto session in January, says state Sen. Ann Gillespie, a Democrat from Arlington Heights. The pending bill would restrict the use of seclusion and restraint and allow them only when there is an “imminent” danger of serious physical harm, Richards, of the Tribune and Cohen, of ProPublica Illinois write.
Thanks for reading The Spin, the Tribune’s politics newsletter. Sign up here to have it delivered to your inbox weekday afternoons. Have a tip? Email host Lisa Donovan at ldonovan@chicagotribune.com.
Twitter @byldonovan