Jenn White
Protesters take to the streets of Chicago after officials release the a video of Officer Jason Van Dyke fatally shooting Laquan McDonald. Critics attack the mayor and police department. A federal investigation finds a pattern of abuse by Chicago officers.
The police shooting of Laquan McDonald forces Chicago to prepare for potential riots. We piece together details from McDonald’s too-short life and hear from Officer Jason Van Dyke in his first interview since the shooting.
The trial of Jason Van Dyke begins today. We profile the lawyers and the judge. Two Chicago legal veterans tell us the moves they expect each side to make. And we ask what this trial means for Chicago.
The fatal police shooting of Laquan McDonald aggravated longstanding tensions between Chicago police and the city’s black residents. We look at how a troubled police department spun a narrative of the shooting, how that narrative fell apart, and how the city reacted when it did.
Illinois Governor JB Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot address the state’s response to coronavirus. The Cook County Board of Commissioners vote to give themselves more power. Plus, the Chicago Police Department announces plans to upgrade and remodel its controversial gang database Reset breaks down the biggest local and state news of the week in our Friday News Roundup with host Jenn White. GUESTS: Kristen Schorsch, WBEZ Cook County politics reporter Heather Cherone, managing editor and city hall reporter at the Daily Line Mick Dumke, reporter and columnist ProPublica Illinois
The Rev. Jesse Jackson’s speeches have inspired audiences around the world for more than 50 years. Now, they’re collected in a new book.
Saturday marks the one-year anniversary of the deadly workplace shooting in west suburban Aurora.Five employees were killed, and another employee and five police officers were left injured. Reset checks in with the police chief on how the community is healing from this tragedy one year later, and the role law enforcement plays in this process.
CTA and Pace have tried to reverse falling bus ridership for years. Reset transportation contributor Mary Wisniewski joins the show to share her latest ideas.
In his new book, Chicago Public Schools teacher Gregory Michie writes about what it was like to return to teach in the same middle school in Chicago’s Back of the Yards neighborhood where he began his career after more than a decade as an education professor. Morning Shift digs into what’s different about the teaching profession this decade compared with the late 1990s and how Michie navigates his role as a white teacher in a school that’s almost exclusively made up of black and brown students.
Summer officially starts Friday. Though the weather this week is lining up to be on the cool side, it looks like we’ll reach the 80s by this weekend. Hopefully those warmer temperatures will stick around, so it’s a great time to start planning your outdoor adventures for the summer. Morning Shift checks in with an expert and taps the knowledge of the crowd.
From Legal pot to expanded gambling, from abortion protections to a massive infrastructure bill, lawmakers in Springfield extended the spring legislative session into the weekend and passed virtually everything on Gov. JB Pritzker’s list. Morning Shift breaks down the action and explains what it will mean for the average Illinoisan.
Author and journalist Alex Kotlowitz stays in Chicago for his most recent book: An American Summer: Love and Death in Chicago. In it, Kotlowitz examines Chicago’s gun violence through the experiences of the people — both victims and perpetrators — who live with it, and the resulting fallout everyday. We’re left with a complicated picture of what happens to individuals and neighborhoods when violence and fear are a consistent undercurrent. Alex Kotlowitz joins the Morning Shift to discuss the people and ideas in his new book.
Dominique Morisseau’s play Pipeline tells the story of a woman fighting to keep her son from being sucked into the school to prison pipeline. Chicago poet Gwendolyn Brooks’ famous poem “We Real Cool” serves as a backbone for this work which is an in depth examination of the education system and parenthood. The play is on stage at Victory Gardens Theater in Lincoln Park through March 3.