Welcome to Chicago 312: 3 Headlines. 1 Big Question. 2 Red Flags. Every Wednesday. Subscribe here.

What To Know This Week — TLDR: Medicaid cuts + trans attacks federally are already showing up in Chicago. ICE is still scared to show their faces, and Christian Smalls is being unlawfully detailed by the IDF.

Still: even as systems are either collapsing or being scrubbed of anything that might hold them accountable, many people are filling the gaps, leaking memos, rerouting care, and keeping each other safer than the institutions ever did.

Let’s dive in.

3 Headlines: Closing Hospitals + Watchlists, While ICE Continues to Mask

1. When Care is Conditional

Sun Times, Block Club: In Chicago this week, two separate but deeply connected stories unfolded: one about the quiet dismantling of gender-affirming care for youth, and the other about the Medicare-funded collapse of a safety-net hospital. But both point to the same brutal truth: our healthcare system is held together by tape, silence, and selective survival.

Let’s start with Weiss. The Uptown hospital just got kicked out of the Medicare program after failing to meet basic federal standards — a final blow after years of air conditioning outages, shady real estate deals, and private equity gutting. Medicare made up 65% of its inpatient revenue last year. Now, nearby ERs are overwhelmed, patients are stranded, and no one from ownership is answering calls.

Meanwhile, down the road at Rush and UChicago, gender-affirming care for trans youth is being quietly rolled back. Why? Because the Trump administration’s executive order threatened to cut federal funding from hospitals offering this care — and even in “progressive” Illinois, hospitals blinked. But not everyone folded. A rapid response network of independent providers — doctors like Dr. Jessica Lapinski — is filling the gap, offering hormone therapy and care without federal insurance. It’s a lifeline, but one that only stretches so far.

Why It Matters: These stories are part of the same system of abandonment — private equity carves up safety-net hospitals, which in turn incentivizes hospitals to ditch their most vulnerable patients (especially under perceived federal pressure).

Asher McMaher of Trans Up Front Illinois put it bluntly: “We’re heading toward, in my opinion, like a war. And this is a war on trans people.” But it’s also a war on anyone who can’t pay upfront, who lives in a neighborhood the market doesn’t find profitable, or who depends on government support to survive.

PS — More hopeful: this is why advocates have launched a rapid response network…

2. Eileen O’Neill Burke Quietly Gutted the CPD Watchlist

Chicago Reader: Cook County State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke quietly scrapped the “do not call” list of discredited cops. Then she scrapped the broader Brady disclosure list — the one that flagged cops with a history of lying, coercing confessions, falsifying reports, or being part of right-wing extremist groups. This is how wrongful convictions happen.

In their place? A new system where officers are trusted to voluntarily disclose their own misconduct before testifying. No joke. If a cop falsified evidence in your case, the system now depends on that officer telling the truth about it.

Kim Foxx created the original lists to bring some sunlight into a system that has fueled more exonerations than almost any other jurisdiction in the country. She wasn’t perfect. The lists weren’t perfect. But they were public. They were searchable. They gave people facing charges — and their attorneys — a shot at knowing if the arresting officer had a documented record of lying.

O’Neill Burke’s office now says they’ll maintain an internal database based on a two-page self-report form cops fill out. No requirement to seek out disciplinary records. No system for tracking when judges find officers not credible in court. No public access. Just: trust us.

Why It Matters: People go to prison for decades because of bad cops. Prosecutors have a constitutional obligation to turn over evidence that could undermine a witness’s credibility — and they’re now choosing not to gather it. If you or someone you love gets arrested, you deserve to know if the person who put them in cuffs has a documented history of lying under oath.

3. Masked Raids Hollow Sanctuary

Block Club: Federal immigration agents are detaining people in Chicago while wearing face masks and unmarked uniforms. The same week trans youth were scrambling to find underground care networks, and Medicare patients were turned away from a collapsing safety-net hospital, masked ICE agents were seen abducting people outside a South Loop supervision office.

The “No Secret Police Act of 2025” — introduced by Illinois House reps and backed by AG Kwame Raoul — would require federal agents to identify themselves and wear proper uniforms. And here in Chicago, Alds. Rodriguez and Vasquez introduced a resolution calling on Springfield to do the same. But like many resolutions, it got dumped in the Rules Committee — aka the political graveyard.

Why It Matters: Progressive power in Chicago means nothing if we don't use it to draw real lines in the sand — not just co-sponsor performative resolutions, but demand enforcement, hold federal agencies accountable, and protect the people who live here.

Other Links Worth Checking Out

• Remember the piece last week about Burnett and the CHA that Lizzie Kane wrote for the Tribune last week? Kane was laid off as part of the general struggle between the Tribune’s union and owner Alden, a major loss for decent housing coverage in the city. Alex Nitkin had the best quote on this. Here’s hoping other outlets recognize the value of her housing reporting.

• Chicago organizers are demanding ICE stay out of neighborhood events like Fiesta del Sol, following a recent federal raid in Humboldt Park.

1 Big Question: The Israeli Military Beat a U.S. Labor Leader

The New Republic: The Israeli government is creating famine in Gaza. The U.S. is enabling it.

And now, union organizer Chris Smalls — yes, that Chris Smalls, the Amazon Labor Union leader invited to the White House in 2022 — was just detained and beaten by the Israeli military for trying to deliver food by sea. U.S. media is silent. And the biggest unions in the country, including the Teamsters president, are promoting interviews with right-wing influencers instead.

What happens when even our most visible labor leaders can be brutalized by a foreign military—and the people who claim to stand for workers’ rights, for humanity, for truth, say nothing at all?

2 Red Flags Stressing Me Out Today: Boeing Strike, Digital Security

1. Boeing’s Workers Are Striking

Newsweek: More than 3,200 Boeing workers in St. Louis just voted to strike. These are machinists, engineers, aerospace workers — the people building military jets, training aircraft, and, most recently, the next-gen F-47 fighter jet for the U.S. Air Force. They rejected a contract their own union leadership called “landmark,” saying it failed to meet the cost of living, healthcare, and security demands they’ve earned. A walkout begins August 4. Boeing doesn’t just make passenger jets — it’s one of the largest military contractors in the world. That includes the systems used by Israel in its war on Gaza. It also includes the fighters now being built in St. Louis by the very workers demanding a better contract. Boeing has been under investigation — again — after a 787 Dreamliner crashed in India last month, killing 260 people. That’s the same model whistleblower John Barnett spent years warning about before being found dead in his truck earlier this year, days after testifying against the company. Another whistleblower, Sam Salehpour, testified to Congress that the planes were so poorly assembled they could “break apart midair.” He said he feared retaliation.

Why It Matters: Boeing has repeatedly shown that it will risk lives to protect its stock price — and still, no one goes to jail. Because the same company under federal investigation for faked inspections is still getting billion-dollar deals to build fighter jets — while workers fighting for pensions are told the offer on the table is generous enough.

And because when labor stands up to military-industrial power, even if just for better benefits and working conditions, it opens the door for bigger questions…

2. How to Disappear from the Internet

For Good Code: This is a comprehensive, actionable guide on how to disappear from the internet. Whether you’re trying to reduce your digital footprint, escape doxxing threats, or just reclaim your damn privacy — this is the clearest walk-through I’ve seen.

Why It Matters: The internet remembers everything unless you make it forget. So often I feel like digital security for people who are concerned about surveillance is in actionable or an accessible – – this round up is something that you could probably do on just a few hours and it doesn't require Linux.

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So much of what we’re seeing — from ICE raids at community events, to trans kids forced into shadow networks for care, to a labor organizer beaten by a foreign military while our institutions go quiet —

Personally, I feel like every new week of breaking news demands more, but more things that are quieter and harder: the willingness to stay with discomfort and take action. Whether that’s calling a rep, walking someone to an event, blocking a weapons shipment (this one is the aspirational goal I guess), or just helping a friend figure out how to disappear from the internet — it all matters, even if they are VERY different in terms of personal scope, risk, scale, capacity. I really believe that, even when it feels wholly inadequate in the day to day.

Coming Soon: Q+As with Sunjay Kumar, Mike Simmons, Robert Peters, and a conversation with Convergence Magazine.

See you next Wednesday.

_{All typos are intentional 4D chess.}

PS — We do video now.