Topspin Chicago and Illinois have gotten in on the lawsuit against the federal government over a citizenship question on the 2020 census, the latest legal action from Mayor Rahm Emanuel against President Donald Trump's administration. The lawsuit was filed in New York, but Emanuel and state Attorney General Lisa Madigan said Tuesday that they're on board. The mayor has made opposing the Trump administration a priority in a city where Hillary Clinton handily won in the 2016 presidential election and much of the large Hispanic population opposes the president's agenda on immigration. The city last year sued the Justice Department to try to prevent Attorney General Jeff Sessions from withholding public safety grant money from cities that don't cooperate with immigration agents. And it has filed various court briefs in support of efforts to oppose the Trump administration's attempts to restrict travel to the U.S. from majority Muslim countries. Emanuel created a $1 million "legal protection fund" to help immigrants fighting possible deportation, and he has taken every opportunity to publicly rip Trump's efforts to weaken or do away with the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. Democrats behind the latest lawsuit worry that asking about citizenship will depress immigrants' participation in the census, which could make a difference in the population count of a diverse city like Chicago. If the city and state show lower numbers in the census, they could get less federal money and fewer members in Congress. White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders has said the census citizenship question is "necessary for the Department of Justice to protect voters, specifically to help us better comply with the Voting Rights Act, which is something that's important and a part of this process." (John Byrne) What's on tap *Mayor Emanuel has no public events scheduled. *Gov. Bruce Rauner has no public events scheduled. *Attorney General Lisa Madigan will hold a downtown news conference about training hospital staff to care for sexual assault victims. *Two Illinois House committees meet at the Bilandic Building, including one to talk about President Donald Trump's infrastructure plan. From the notebook *Too late? Illinois is in line to receive $13 million from the federal government to help beef up election security, but officials on Tuesday raised questions about whether the money will make it to the counties that need it in time for the November election. The money is part of a $380 million pot of funding intended to be doled out to the sates and was included in a federal spending bill approved by President Donald Trump in late March. Illinois is one of the states that had its voter data hacked in 2016. Cristina Cray, director of legislation at the State Board of Elections, told a panel of lawmakers Tuesday that the board was expecting to have the money in hand within 40 to 50 days, but wasn't sure how it would be distributed. "I don't want to rush to spend that," Cray said. "I want to do whatever we can in the next seven months, but I want to use that money wisely." Some counties might be needier than others, said Noah Praetz, director of elections at the Cook County Clerk's office. He said Cook already is beefing up election security and that the county was in good shape to continue as planned. He said he was concerned about smaller counties that have fewer resources and aren't already in the process of improving their security measures. "This is a weak link problem, and that's where most of the attention and resources need to be focused as quickly as possible," Praetz said. He warned that distributing the money to those needier counties in such a short time is "going to be a fairly large bureaucratic challenge." (Kim Geiger) *Quick spin: The city announced it's awarding more than $440,000 to Catholic Charities, Phalanx Family Services and a the Chicago Citywide Literacy Coalition to help implement its municipal ID program. The groups are tasked with telling people about it and helping them apply. What we're writing *Pritzker: Raise state tax rate, boost exemptions while working on a graduated income tax. *Illinois lawmakers weigh sports gambling, as NBA and MLB officials back the idea. *O'Hare's on-time performance improves, moves from bottom of the pile to middle. *Metra to end ticket sales on its website, but Ventra app unaffected. *Deerfield bans assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. What we're reading *Fewer deaths, but more recalls from kids' products, report finds. *40 comedies from the past 40 years that changed the way we talk. *Parson's Chicken & Fish, Revolution Brewing team up on beer. Follow the money *Track Illinois campaign contributions in real time here and here. Beyond Chicago *President Trump says he'll send military to border with Mexico. *Remembering MLK 50 years after his death. *Dutch attorney sentenced in Mueller probe. *Oklahoma teacher strike continues. | 
沒有留言:
張貼留言