Illinois news

• The madness and mayhem of Midsummer Night’s Dream

  30-04-2024 23:20 via chicagoreader.com
  
  The rose gold interior of the Lyric Opera House is dappled with green light, as if filtered through leaves on a forest floor. Birdsong penetrates the space, sweet and ineffable in a place typically infused with the artifice of orchestral sound. Beneath a twinkling canopy of lights is a twin bed, upon which reclines a […]
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• Bears CEO Hosts Business Leadership Council Meeting at Soldier Field

  21-05-2024 16:00 via chicagodefender.com
  
  World Business Chicago Board Vice-Chair Charles Smith with in discussion with Chicago Bears Team President and CEO Kevin Warren (Credit: Erika Bracey Photography).
  The Business Leadership Council recently held its Q2 General Membership Meeting at the iconic Soldier Field. The event was hosted by the Chicago Bears and the team’s President and Chief Executive Officer, Kevin Warren. Attendees were treated to an enlightening conversation with Warren and World Business Chicago Board Vice-Chair
  
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• BREAKING NEWS: April Verrett elected 1st Black president of SEIU

  21-05-2024 15:30 via chicagodefender.com
  
  (Courtesy Image)
  April Verrett has been elected as the first Black president of the Service Employees International Union. The announcement was made today, May 20, at the SEIU convention in Philadelphia.
  Verrett currently serves as international secretary-treasurer of the 103-year old union, which represents nearly 2 million workers in health care, property service and government service.
  Verrett is a Southside Chicago native, who has a long history of working on behalf of union workers. Her gra
  
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• The President’s Visit to Detroit Was as Much Anti-Trump as it Was Pro-Biden

  21-05-2024 15:02 via chicagodefender.com
  President Joe Biden’s trip to Detroit Sunday, May 19, marked his second official trip to the city this year. The first came in February, when he stopped to meet with UAW leaders as a follow-up to his 2023 visit to stand on the picket lines with striking auto workers.
  This visit looked a little different. He still stopped at a local business – CRED Café – and he still met with local elected officials and clergy like he did on his previous visit, but his agenda was clear:
  
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• First Black Astronaut Candidate Becomes Oldest Person To Reach Space

  21-05-2024 14:30 via chicagodefender.com
  
  Photo: eddwight.com
  Ed Dwight, a 90-year-old man set to become America’s first Black astronaut decades ago, finally made it to space, NPR reports.
  On Sunday (May 19), Dwight traveled to space on the New Shephard rocket through Blue Origin, a space exploration company founded by Jeff Bezos. Dwight made the roughly 10-minute trip to space alongside venture capitalist Mason Angel, Sylvain Chiron, the founder of a French craft brewery, entrepreneur Kenneth Hess, aviator Gopi Thotakura, and Car
  
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• Revisiting the crime of the century

  21-05-2024 14:00 via chicagoreader.com
  
  Long-form writing and long-distance running are a natural pair: sweaty, solitary, self-driven sports that, when going poorly, turn you into a deeply unpleasant person to be around, but when going well, give you a high you’ll chase for the rest of your life. Sometimes, you hit a trancelike state, and the miles or words flow […]
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• J. Pharoah Doss: There’s lies, darn lies, and crime statistics

  21-05-2024 14:00 via chicagodefender.com
  
  In April 2015, a Black man died in the back of a police vehicle in Baltimore, sparking weeks of protests and rioting. Black Lives Matter activists told the media that White racism was the source of “state-sponsored violence.”
  Conservatives argued that internal problems in Black communities, such as Black-on-Black violence, were more serious than external issues. The BLM activists accused conservatives of blaming the victims while disregarding systemic racism.
  While BLM activists and
  
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• Doing it for the gaze

  20-05-2024 22:24 via chicagoreader.com
  
  What was in the water in Hollywood in the late 80s and early 90s to instigate so many films (Fatal Attraction, She-Devil, Soapdish) about obsessed and vengeful women? Was it just part of the backlash to feminism anatomized by Susan Faludi? Or did these stories in some way tap into the rage of women who […]
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• REGIONAL TRANSPORTATION AUTHORITY OF NORTHEASTERN ILLINOIS (“RTA”) REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS

  20-05-2024 20:44 via chicagodefender.com
  
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• Meet Omari K. Prince: 2024 Chicago Defender Men of Excellence Honoree

  20-05-2024 16:00 via chicagodefender.com
  
  Omari K. Prince is a lion for the Illinois small business community. 
  As Director of Government Affairs for the Small Business Advisory Council, he engages with elected officials and policymakers and lobbies on behalf of the small business community and neighborhood business districts in Chicago and across Illinois. 
  He is pivotal in ensuring that the SBAC fulfills its mission of promoting “the success of small business through political advocacy, support services and educational
  
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• Black Woman Shot & Killed In Front Of Grandchildren On Mother’s Day

  20-05-2024 14:30 via chicagodefender.com
  
  Photo: Central Alabama CrimeStoppers
  An Alabama grandmother was hosting a Mother’s Day celebration when she was shot and killed in front of her grandchildren, per PEOPLE.
  64-year-old Gloria Crews died on Sunday (May 14) after someone opened fire at her outdoor party in Montgomery, Alabama. Montgomery police and fire medics responded to the shooting at around 7:02 p.m. but were unable to revive Crews. She was pronounced dead at the scene.
  Crews was reportedly shot as she was directing child
  
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• Documenting queer grassroots organizing

  20-05-2024 14:00 via chicagoreader.com
  
  “Images on which to build, 1970s-1990s” is a powerful introduction to how queer and trans communities visually documented and expressed themselves between the uprising at Stonewall and the legalization of gay marriage. From portraits and documentary-style protest images to flyers, magazines, calendars, and collages, this exhibition is a delicious buffet of gender, racial, and class […]
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• President Joe Biden Meets with Black Detroiter’s at CRED Café Ahead of NAACP Keynote Address

  19-05-2024 22:01 via chicagodefender.com
  
  President Joe Biden is making his rounds with Black voters across the country.
  Today, President Biden is in Detroit to deliver the keynote address for the Detroit NAACP’s 69th Annual Fight for Freedom Fund Dinner. After landing in Detroit shortly after 1 p.m. on Sunday, May 19, Biden made his way straight to Detroit’s CRED Café, in Rivertown to have a private conversation with Detroit residents. 
  CRED Café, which is the brainchild of former NBA athletes and sibling
  
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• Tesa Anewishki: Championing Equity and Transformation in Healthcare

  19-05-2024 16:00 via chicagodefender.com
  
  Before Tesa Anewishki became the first African and Native-American CEO of Loretto Hospital, she received an early holiday lesson in her youth about the importance of giving and selflessness. 
  It came via a bearded man — not the one you’re thinking of — on a downtown Chicago street when she was around 13. This man had a garbage bag and icicles in his beard.
  So, Anewishki’s mother pulled over, got out of the car, and disappeared into a department store. 
  An hour l
  
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• Why I Want Cardi B to Vote

  19-05-2024 15:45 via chicagodefender.com
  
  “Black Vote, Black Power,” a collaboration between Keith Boykin and Word In Black, examines the issues, the candidates, and what’s at stake for Black America in the 2024 presidential election.
  by Keith Boykin
  Cardi says she’s not voting. But if voting didn’t matter, Republicans wouldn’t be trying so hard to stop us from doing it.
  In a new interview with Rolling Stone magazine, Cardi B explained why she won’t be voting in the November
  
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• King College Prep Principal Brian Kelly Wins 2024 Golden Apple Award

  19-05-2024 15:00 via chicagodefender.com
  
  Principal Brian Kelly of Martin Luther King College Prep receives the Golden Apple Award (Photo-Golden Apple Foundation).
  The Golden Apple Foundation, the leading Illinois-based nonprofit committed to preparing, mentoring, and honoring great educators who advance educational opportunities for students, recently surprised Brian Kelly, principal of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. College Prep High School in Chicago, with the Golden Apple Award for Excellence in Leadership, presented in honor of foundin
  
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• Black Teen Accepted Into 122 Schools, Earns Over $5 Million In Scholarships

  19-05-2024 14:30 via chicagodefender.com
  
  Photo: Getty Images
  An Oakland, California high school student has raked in over 100 college acceptances.
  According to NBC Bay Area, Helms Ategeka, a Head-Royce School student, garnered $5.3 million in scholarships from 122 colleges.
  “I feel really lucky that there are people out there, that there are institutions out there that see the value that I have to give,” Helms said.
  Helms said he believes his array of extracurriculars, including choir, theater, and a club he started himself
  
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• Hyde Park Summer Fest Canceled Due to Rising Security Costs

  18-05-2024 15:30 via chicagodefender.com
  
  The Hyde Park Summer Fest, one of the most popular Southside Summer events, is canceled this year. Event organizers called off the event due to rising security costs. 
  The cancellation comes a year after the Summer Fest held its most significant event, featuring notable Hip-hop acts like 2 Chainz, Clipse, and Lil Kim and attracting thousands nationwide to the spacious Midway Plaisance. 
  According to event organizers, the cost of hosting an event of that scale became untenable. As the S
  
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• Marjorie Taylor Greene Attacks Jasmine Crockett’s Appearance, Chaos Erupts

  18-05-2024 14:45 via chicagodefender.com
  
  Photo: Getty Images
  Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R) launched a personal attack against Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D), sparking chaos during a House Oversight Committee meeting.
  On Thursday (May 16) night, lawmakers gathered for a House Oversight Committee meeting over whether Attorney General Merrick Garland should be held in contempt of Congress for declining to hand over audio recordings of President Joe Biden’s interview with special counsel Robert Hur about his handling of classified docum
  
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• Florida A&M Launches Investigation Into $237 Million ‘Gift’ Deemed Hoax

  18-05-2024 14:00 via chicagodefender.com
  
  Photo: Getty Images
  Florida A&M University officials have launched an investigation into a $237 million donation that was seemingly fraudulent, The Root reports.
  The investigation comes after FAMU announced earlier this month that it had received a $237 million gift from Batterson Farms Corp. CEO Gregory Gerami.
  The historic donation was placed on hold and ultimately “ceased” after questions of the transaction’s validity arose. Amid the controversy, Shawnta Friday-Stroud, F
  
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• Review: Doctor Who (Season one/Series 14)

  17-05-2024 20:19 via chicagoreader.com
  
  After 60-plus years as a strictly British institution, the BBC’s beloved long-running sci-fi series Doctor Who is finally taking the TARDIS across the pond. For the first time in the show’s history, instead of airing first in the UK and then internationally, Doctor Who will drop on Fridays on Disney+ in the United States (and […]
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• Review: Back to Black

  17-05-2024 20:19 via chicagoreader.com
  
  In its first five minutes, Back to Black all but looks directly at the audience and recites facts about Amy Winehouse (Marisa Abela) as if reading from a checklist: she’s a supremely talented singer with a flair for the dramatic and an old soul who can’t understand why other young people don’t like jazz. The […]
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• Review: IF

  17-05-2024 20:18 via chicagoreader.com
  
  There’s a fine line between the whimsical dream logic of Roald Dahl and irritating, incoherent nonsense. Director John Krasinski’s new kids film IF is nowhere near that line. Despite the best efforts of the extremely talented child actor Cailey Fleming, IF makes no sense, narratively, emotionally, or visually. The only fun to be had is […]
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• Review: In the Fade

  17-05-2024 20:17 via chicagoreader.com
  
  Fatih Akin’s 2017 In The Fade (Aus dem Nichts) starts out as a painful and necessary examination of the human costs of right-wing ideology and neo-Nazi violence. Reformed drug dealer, travel agent, and translator Nuri Şekerci (Numan Acar) and his son Rocco (Rafael Santana) are killed by a neo-Nazi nail bomb, leaving wife and mother […]
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• collected thesis statements

  17-05-2024 19:22 via chicagoreader.com
  
  By JK Anowe
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• CCPSA nominees advance, Mohawk Johnson takes plea deal, First Nations Garden vandalized

  17-05-2024 17:00 via chicagoreader.com
  
  CCPSA nominees (mostly) move forward The City Council’s Police and Fire Committee on May 14 gave the nod to six of the seven candidates nominated to serve on the Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability (CCPSA). The nominees, selected by Mayor Brandon Johnson from a list of 15 people put forward by representatives from […]
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• Review: Thelma the Unicorn

  17-05-2024 16:00 via chicagoreader.com
  
  Kids love unicorns. It’s just a fact. They’re sparkly, cute, and always have some kind of magical rainbow vibes radiating off of them. But what about boring old brown farm ponies? Does anyone care nearly as much about them—even if they’re imbued with a superstar singing voice? That’s the question at hand in Thelma the […]
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• Review: The Big Cigar (Miniseries)

  17-05-2024 16:00 via chicagoreader.com
  
  What can be said about an icon? Apple TV+’s The Big Cigar sets itself an impossible task: telling a meaningful story about one of the most compelling and provocative political figures of the 20th century, Black Panther Party cofounder Huey Newton. In 1966, Newton cofounded the party with Bobby Seale and served as its first […]
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• Levi Holloway’s Turret is a 21st-century Endgame

  17-05-2024 16:00 via chicagoreader.com
  
  If you’ve been looking for the 21st century’s answer to Samuel Beckett’s Endgame, your wait is over. Levi Holloway’s Turret, now in a world premiere (also directed by the playwright) with A Red Orchid Theatre, taps into the same existential dread and odd father-son dynamics present in Beckett’s 1957 masterpiece.  But Holloway (who won raves […]
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• Collaborative Bridges Breaks Ground on West Side Wellness Center

  17-05-2024 16:00 via chicagodefender.com
  
  With a promise and passion to transform behavioral health services on the West Side of Chicago, Collaborative Bridges hosted a groundbreaking ceremony where enthusiastic Chicagoans gathered at their facility at 4223 West Lake Street to partake in the celebration. 
  Collaborative Bridges Wellness Center in West Garfield Park is a partnership of West Side Chicago safety net hospitals and community mental health agencies designed to ensure that the care of people experiencing mental health and
  
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