fortune year of the rabbit 2023
ATLANTA (AP) — As she checked into a recent flight to Mexico for vacation, Teja Smith chuckled at the idea of joining another . As a Black woman, she just couldn’t see herself helping to replicate the largest act of resistance against first term in January 2017. Even in an election this year where Trump , held rallies featuring and falsely claimed Black migrants in Ohio were eating residents’ , he didn’t just win a second term. He became the first Republican in two decades to clinch the popular vote, although by a small margin. “It’s like the people have spoken and this is what America looks like,” said Smith, the Los Angeles-based founder of the advocacy social media agency, Get Social. “And there’s not too much more fighting that you’re going to be able to do without losing your own sanity.” After Trump was declared the winner over , many politically engaged Black women said they were so dismayed by the outcome that they were reassessing — but not completely abandoning — their enthusiasm for electoral politics and movement organizing. Black women often carry much of the work of getting out the vote in their communities. They had vigorously supported the historic candidacy of Harris, who would have been the first woman of Black and South Asian descent to win the presidency. Harris’ loss spurred a wave of Black women across social media resolving to prioritize themselves, before giving so much to a country that over and over has shown its indifference to their concerns. , a survey of more than 120,000 voters, found that 6 in 10 Black women said the future of democracy in the United States was the single most important factor for their vote this year, a higher share than for other demographic groups. But now, with Trump set to return to office in two months, some Black women are renewing calls to emphasize rest, focus on mental health and become more selective about what fight they lend their organizing power to. “America is going to have to save herself,” said LaTosha Brown, the co-founder of the national voting rights group Black Voters Matter. She compared Black women’s presence in social justice movements as “core strategists and core organizers” to the North Star, known as the most consistent and dependable star in the galaxy because of its seemingly fixed position in the sky. People can rely on Black women to lead change, Brown said, but the next four years will look different. “That’s not a herculean task that’s for us. We don’t want that title. ... I have no goals to be a martyr for a nation that cares nothing about me,” she said. AP VoteCast paints a clear picture of Black women’s concerns. Black female voters were most likely to say that democracy was the single most important factor for their vote, compared to other motivators such as high prices or abortion. More than 7 in 10 Black female voters said they were “very concerned” that electing Trump would lead the nation toward authoritarianism, while only about 2 in 10 said this about Harris. About 9 in 10 Black female voters supported Harris in 2024, according to AP VoteCast, similar to the share that backed Democrat Joe Biden in 2020. Trump received support from more than half of white voters, who made up the vast majority of his coalition in both years. Like voters overall, Black women were most likely to say the economy and jobs were the most important issues facing the country, with about one-third saying that. But they were more likely than many other groups to say that abortion and racism were the top issues, and much less likely than other groups to say immigration was the top issue. Despite those concerns, which were well-voiced by Black women throughout the campaign, increased support from and white women helped expand Trump’s lead and secured his victory. Politically engaged Black women said they don’t plan to continue positioning themselves in the vertebrae of the “backbone” of America’s democracy. The growing movement prompting Black women to withdraw is a shift from history, where they are often present and at the forefront of political and social change. One of the earliest examples is the women’s suffrage movement that led to ratification in 1920 of the , which gave women the right to vote. Black women, however, were prevented from voting for decades afterward because of Jim Crow-era literacy tests, poll taxes and laws that blocked the grandchildren of slaves from voting. Most Black women couldn’t vote until the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Black women were among the organizers and counted among the marchers brutalized on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Alabama, during from Selma to Montgomery that preceded federal legislation. Decades later, Black women were prominent organizers of the Black Lives Matter movement in response to the deaths of Black Americans at the hands of police and vigilantes. In his 2024 campaign, Trump called for leveraging federal money to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programs in government programs and discussions of race, gender or sexual orientation in schools. His rhetoric on immigration, including that Black Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, were eating cats and dogs, drove support for his plan to . Tenita Taylor, a Black resident of Atlanta who supported Trump this year, said she was initially excited about Harris’ candidacy. But after thinking about how high her grocery bills have been, she feels that voting for Trump in hopes of finally was a form of self-prioritization. “People say, ‘Well, that’s selfish, it was gonna be better for the greater good,”’ she said. “I’m a mother of five kids. ... The things that (Democrats) do either affect the rich or the poor.” Some of Trump’s plans affect people in Olivia Gordon’s immediate community, which is why she struggled to get behind the “Black women rest” wave. Gordon, a New York-based lawyer who supported the Party for Socialism and Liberation’s presidential nominee, Claudia de la Cruz, worries about who may be left behind if the 92% of Black women voters who backed Harris simply stopped advocating. “We’re talking millions of Black women here. If millions of Black women take a step back, it absolutely leaves holes, but for other Black women,” she said. “I think we sometimes are in the bubble of if it’s not in your immediate circle, maybe it doesn’t apply to you. And I truly implore people to understand that it does.” Nicole Lewis, an Alabama-based therapist who specializes in treating Black women’s stress, said she’s aware that Black women withdrawing from social impact movements could have a fallout. But she also hopes that it forces a reckoning for the nation to understand the consequences of not standing in solidarity with Black women. “It could impact things negatively because there isn’t that voice from the most empathetic group,” she said. “I also think it’s going to give other groups an opportunity to step up. ... My hope is that they do show up for themselves and everyone else.” Brown said a reckoning might be exactly what the country needs, but it’s a reckoning for everyone else. Black women, she said, did their job when they supported Harris in droves in hopes they could thwart the massive changes expected under Trump. “This ain’t our reckoning,” she said. “I don’t feel no guilt.” The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stock indexes drifted lower Tuesday in the runup to the highlight of the week for the market, the latest update on inflation that’s coming on Wednesday. The S&P 500 dipped 0.3%, a day after pulling back from its latest all-time high . They’re the first back-to-back losses for the index in nearly a month, as momentum slows following a big rally that has it on track for one of its best years of the millennium . The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 154 points, or 0.3%, and the Nasdaq composite slipped 0.3%. Tech titan Oracle dragged on the market and sank 6.7% after reporting growth for the latest quarter that fell just short of analysts’ expectations. It was one of the heaviest weights on the S&P 500, even though CEO Safra Catz said the company saw record demand related to artificial-intelligence technology for its cloud infrastructure business, which trains generative AI models. AI has been a big source of growth that’s helped many companies’ stock prices skyrocket. Oracle’s stock had already leaped more than 80% for the year coming into Tuesday, which raised the bar of expectations for its profit report. In the bond market, Treasury yields ticked higher ahead of Wednesday’s report on the inflation that U.S. consumers are feeling. Economists expect it to show similar increases as the month before. Wednesday’s update and a report on Thursday about inflation at the wholesale level will be the final big pieces of data the Federal Reserve will get before its meeting next week, where many investors expect the year’s third cut to interest rates . The Fed has been easing its main interest rate from a two-decade high since September to take pressure off the slowing jobs market, after bringing inflation nearly down to its 2% target. Lower rates would help give support to the economy, but they could also provide more fuel for inflation. Expectations for a series of cuts through next year have been a big reason the S&P 500 has set so many records this year. Trading in the options market suggests traders aren’t expecting a very big move for U.S. stocks following Wednesday’s report, according to strategists at Barclays. But a reading far off expectations in either direction could quickly change that. The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.22% from 4.20% late Monday. Even though the Fed has been cutting its main interest rate, mortgage rates have been more stubborn to stay high and have been volatile since the autumn. That has hampered the housing industry, and homebuilder Toll Brothers’ stock fell 6.9% even though it delivered profit and revenue for the latest quarter that topped analysts’ expectations. CEO Douglas Yearley Jr. said the luxury builder has been seeing strong demand since the start of its fiscal year six weeks ago, an encouraging signal as it approaches the beginning of the spring selling season in mid-January. Elsewhere on Wall Street, Alaska Air Group soared 13.2% after raising its forecast for profit in the current quarter. The airline said demand for flying around the holidays has been stronger than expected. It also approved a plan to buy back up to $1 billion of its stock, along with new service from Seattle to Tokyo and Seoul . Boeing climbed 4.5% after saying it’s resuming production of its bestselling plane , the 737 Max, for the first time since 33,000 workers began a seven-week strike that ended in early November. Vail Resorts rose 2.5% after the ski resort operator reported a smaller first-quarter loss than analysts expected in what is traditionally its worst quarter. All told, the S&P 500 fell 17.94 points to 6,034.91. The Dow dipped 154.10 to 44,247.83, and the Nasdaq composite slipped 49.45 to 19,687.24. In stock markets abroad, indexes were mixed in China after the world’s second-largest economy said its exports rose by less than expected in November. Stocks rose 0.6% in Shanghai but fell 0.5% in Hong Kong. Indexes fell across much of Europe ahead of a meeting this week by the European Central Bank, where the widespread expectation is for another cut in interest rates. AP Business Writers Matt Ott and Elaine Kurtenbach contributed.
WASHINGTON (AP) — In the history of American politics, there's no shortage of presidents who promised to shake up Washington once they got to the White House. But Donald Trump may prove to be in a class of his own, and he appears more interested in beating the federal government into submission than recalibrating it. In staffing his administration, Trump has shown an inclination to select people who distrust or even disdain the agencies that they've been chosen to lead, setting up a potential war of attrition between the incoming Republican president and American institutions. “There’s been nothing like what Trump is suggesting to do," said Doug Brinkley, a presidential historian. "We’re talking about dismantling the federal government.” Trump's approach will become even clearer this week as Kash Patel, his choice for FBI director , heads to Capitol Hill for an initial round of meetings with senators who will decide whether to confirm him to the post. A former national security official who has branded himself as an eager acolyte of Trump, Patel has talked about shutting down the agency's headquarters, splitting up its responsibilities and targeting Trump's perceived enemies. Greg Brower, a former U.S. attorney who served as the FBI’s top congressional affairs official, said Trump seems to want to make the nation’s law enforcement institutions “part of his political operation run out of the White House.” “That’s a major course change that I’m just not sure a majority of senators are willing to endorse," Brower said. Republican senators are already considering whether to support Pete Hegseth, whom Trump wants to lead the Pentagon , despite allegations of sexual misconduct, excessive drinking and financial mismanagement. Hegseth is an Army veteran and former Fox News commentator who has described the military as flooded with “woke” liberal ideology. He also wants to remove women from combat roles. Karoline Leavitt, a spokesperson for Trump’s transition team and the incoming White House press secretary, said the next administration wants to “shatter the Deep State," a term for entrenched civil servants who have frustrated Trump and his allies. “President Trump was re-elected by a resounding mandate from the American people to change the status quo in Washington,” she said in a statement. “That’s why he has chosen brilliant and highly-respected outsiders to serve in his Administration, and he will continue to stand behind them as they fight against all those who seek to derail the MAGA Agenda.” Margaret Spelling, who served as education secretary under President George W. Bush, said it is “probably not a good management style" to treat government employees as adversaries. “If you’re going to turn the tide or redirect the ship of state, you’ve got to have help doing it," she said. "And that’s people who work there already.” Spelling's former department could be outright eliminated if Trump has his way. His choice of education secretary , Linda McMahon, has never worked in the field. She served for one year on the Connecticut Board of Education and is a member of the board of trustees at a private university. McMahon lead the Small Business Administration during Trump's first term, and she made a name for herself by running World Wrestling Entertainment, a cultural juggernaut that features musclebound men beating each other up in elaborately scripted fights. Trump's plans for the federal government blend conservative ideology, which has long viewed Washington as too intrusive in Americans' daily lives, with his personal vendettas. After being plagued by investigations and contradicted by career officials during his first term, the returning president has no interest in a replay and he's more skeptical of insider views that clash with his own instincts. Some of his personnel choices have alarmed political opponents, but Trump's approach could prove appealing to voters whose faith in government has sunk to record lows in recent years. Only about 2 in 10 Americans trust the government to do the right thing always or most of the time, according to the Pew Research Center , down from around 4 in 10 who said this in 2000 — before the upheaval of a global financial crisis, an inconclusive war on terrorism and a worldwide pandemic. Story continues below video Kay Schlozman, a Boston College political science professor, said Trump's nominees could be viewed as "an extension of his capacity to question the received wisdom and question the supposed elites who always run everything.” Some of the largest gaps between expertise and personnel have been evident in public health. Trump chose Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead the Department of Health and Human Services despite his reputation as one of the most prolific spreaders of unfounded theories about the supposed danger of vaccines. Trump also picked Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a critic of public health measures like lockdowns and vaccine mandates that were used during the coronavirus outbreak, to run the National Institutes of Health , the country's top medical research agency. In other areas of government, loyalty has often been prized over expertise. Lee Zeldin, a former New York congressman, never served on any committees dealing with the environment during nearly a decade on Capitol Hill. Now he’s on deck to lead the Environmental Protection Agency. Brinkley said it's not uncommon to have presidents attempt to change how Washington works. Richard Nixon tried to circumvent government agencies by centralizing decision-making in the White House, and Warren Harding stocked his Cabinet with business leaders. But Brinkley said Trump's approach is more venomous, and he seems to be setting up his staff to compete to be the most zealous. “It’s got a gladiator feel," he said. "They each want to show that they’ve got a scalp to punish the so-called deep state, the legacy media or the Democratic Party.” Another way that Trump is taking on Washington is the Department of Government Efficiency , an independent advisory organization that will be run by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy. Musk, the world's richest man, and Ramaswamy, an entrepreneur, plan to provide ideas on dramatically reducing federal spending and cutting the government workforce. They also said Trump should sidestep Congress whenever possible, setting up a potential constitutional clash. Theda Skocpol, a Harvard University professor of government and sociology, agreed that Americans are often doubtful about Washington's effectiveness. “But it doesn’t mean there’s going to be an easy path to eliminating entire departments or functions of government because people will realize they have the stakes in those things,” she said. However, Skocpol said, chaos might be the actual goal. “Parts of American conservatism have been trying to make government a mess when they control it, and then use it as an argument for less government," she said. ____ Associated Press writer Eric Tucker contributed to this report.
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NoneBy KENYA HUNTER, Associated Press ATLANTA (AP) — As she checked into a recent flight to Mexico for vacation, Teja Smith chuckled at the idea of joining another Women’s March on Washington . As a Black woman, she just couldn’t see herself helping to replicate the largest act of resistance against then-President Donald Trump’s first term in January 2017. Even in an election this year where Trump questioned his opponent’s race , held rallies featuring racist insults and falsely claimed Black migrants in Ohio were eating residents’ pets , he didn’t just win a second term. He became the first Republican in two decades to clinch the popular vote, although by a small margin. “It’s like the people have spoken and this is what America looks like,” said Smith, the Los Angeles-based founder of the advocacy social media agency, Get Social. “And there’s not too much more fighting that you’re going to be able to do without losing your own sanity.” After Trump was declared the winner over Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris , many politically engaged Black women said they were so dismayed by the outcome that they were reassessing — but not completely abandoning — their enthusiasm for electoral politics and movement organizing. Black women often carry much of the work of getting out the vote in their communities. They had vigorously supported the historic candidacy of Harris, who would have been the first woman of Black and South Asian descent to win the presidency. Harris’ loss spurred a wave of Black women across social media resolving to prioritize themselves, before giving so much to a country that over and over has shown its indifference to their concerns. AP VoteCast , a survey of more than 120,000 voters, found that 6 in 10 Black women said the future of democracy in the United States was the single most important factor for their vote this year, a higher share than for other demographic groups. But now, with Trump set to return to office in two months, some Black women are renewing calls to emphasize rest, focus on mental health and become more selective about what fight they lend their organizing power to. “America is going to have to save herself,” said LaTosha Brown, the co-founder of the national voting rights group Black Voters Matter. She compared Black women’s presence in social justice movements as “core strategists and core organizers” to the North Star, known as the most consistent and dependable star in the galaxy because of its seemingly fixed position in the sky. People can rely on Black women to lead change, Brown said, but the next four years will look different. “That’s not a herculean task that’s for us. We don’t want that title. ... I have no goals to be a martyr for a nation that cares nothing about me,” she said. AP VoteCast paints a clear picture of Black women’s concerns. Black female voters were most likely to say that democracy was the single most important factor for their vote, compared to other motivators such as high prices or abortion. More than 7 in 10 Black female voters said they were “very concerned” that electing Trump would lead the nation toward authoritarianism, while only about 2 in 10 said this about Harris. About 9 in 10 Black female voters supported Harris in 2024, according to AP VoteCast, similar to the share that backed Democrat Joe Biden in 2020. Trump received support from more than half of white voters, who made up the vast majority of his coalition in both years. Like voters overall, Black women were most likely to say the economy and jobs were the most important issues facing the country, with about one-third saying that. But they were more likely than many other groups to say that abortion and racism were the top issues, and much less likely than other groups to say immigration was the top issue. Despite those concerns, which were well-voiced by Black women throughout the campaign, increased support from young men of color and white women helped expand Trump’s lead and secured his victory. Politically engaged Black women said they don’t plan to continue positioning themselves in the vertebrae of the “backbone” of America’s democracy. The growing movement prompting Black women to withdraw is a shift from history, where they are often present and at the forefront of political and social change. One of the earliest examples is the women’s suffrage movement that led to ratification in 1920 of the 19th Amendment to the Constitution , which gave women the right to vote. Black women, however, were prevented from voting for decades afterward because of Jim Crow-era literacy tests, poll taxes and laws that blocked the grandchildren of slaves from voting. Most Black women couldn’t vote until the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Black women were among the organizers and counted among the marchers brutalized on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Alabama, during the historic march in 1965 from Selma to Montgomery that preceded federal legislation. Decades later, Black women were prominent organizers of the Black Lives Matter movement in response to the deaths of Black Americans at the hands of police and vigilantes. In his 2024 campaign, Trump called for leveraging federal money to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programs in government programs and discussions of race, gender or sexual orientation in schools. His rhetoric on immigration, including false claims that Black Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, were eating cats and dogs, drove support for his plan to deport millions of people . Tenita Taylor, a Black resident of Atlanta who supported Trump this year, said she was initially excited about Harris’ candidacy. But after thinking about how high her grocery bills have been, she feels that voting for Trump in hopes of finally getting lower prices was a form of self-prioritization. “People say, ‘Well, that’s selfish, it was gonna be better for the greater good,”’ she said. “I’m a mother of five kids. ... The things that (Democrats) do either affect the rich or the poor.” Some of Trump’s plans affect people in Olivia Gordon’s immediate community, which is why she struggled to get behind the “Black women rest” wave. Gordon, a New York-based lawyer who supported the Party for Socialism and Liberation’s presidential nominee, Claudia de la Cruz, worries about who may be left behind if the 92% of Black women voters who backed Harris simply stopped advocating. “We’re talking millions of Black women here. If millions of Black women take a step back, it absolutely leaves holes, but for other Black women,” she said. “I think we sometimes are in the bubble of if it’s not in your immediate circle, maybe it doesn’t apply to you. And I truly implore people to understand that it does.” Nicole Lewis, an Alabama-based therapist who specializes in treating Black women’s stress, said she’s aware that Black women withdrawing from social impact movements could have a fallout. But she also hopes that it forces a reckoning for the nation to understand the consequences of not standing in solidarity with Black women. “It could impact things negatively because there isn’t that voice from the most empathetic group,” she said. “I also think it’s going to give other groups an opportunity to step up. ... My hope is that they do show up for themselves and everyone else.” Brown said a reckoning might be exactly what the country needs, but it’s a reckoning for everyone else. Black women, she said, did their job when they supported Harris in droves in hopes they could thwart the massive changes expected under Trump. “This ain’t our reckoning,” she said. “I don’t feel no guilt.” AP polling editor Amelia Thomson DeVeaux and Associated Press writer Linley Sanders in Washington contributed to this report. The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.F1 closer to approving expanded grid for GM entry
Uganda Cranes forward Ivan Ahimbisibwe says that the team is all ready for their two-legged fixture on December 26 and 29, 2024, against Burundi in the African Nations Championship (CHAN) 2024 Qualifier at Hamz Stadium, Nakivubo. Briefing the media this morning after the Cranes wrapped up their final non-residential training session at MTN Omondi Stadium, Lugogo, Ahimbisibwe said the team, which began non-residential training on December 21, will move into camp on December 25 at Nob View Hotel to prepare for the two matches. It is important to note that Uganda, alongside Kenya and Tanzania, has already secured its place at the tournament as a co-host. Meanwhile, Burundi and other nations in the region are competing for the fourth and final slot allocated to East Africa. Ahimbisibwe said the team is in good spirits and has been well-prepared by the coaching staff for the challenge ahead. On CHAN being hosted in Uganda, Ahimbisibwe remarked that it is a significant opportunity for the country to improve its disappointing CHAN record and for the players to showcase their talent on an international stage. Uganda has qualified for the CHAN tournament six times in a row, participating in the 2011, 2014, 2016, 2018, and 2020 editions. However, the team has yet to progress beyond the group stage in any of these tournaments. Meanwhile, CAF recently granted permission to both Uganda and Burundi to play their African Nations Championship (CHAN) 2024 Qualifier matches at Hamz Stadium, Nakivubo, making it the first senior continental fixture the stadium will host its re-opening earlier this year. According to a statement from the Federation of Uganda Football Associations (FUFA), CAF limited the number of fans allowed into the stadium to 7,000 for each game to ensure proper crowd control. This represents half of Nakivubo’s estimated 15,000-seat capacity. But, Rogers Mulindwa, the stadium’s spokesperson, told this publication that they are prepared to comply with all directives as this is the stadium’s inaugural continental assignment. ***** URNCarolyn Goodman passed the torch — or this case a gavel — to new Las Vegas Mayor Shelley Berkley on Wednesday, marking a new era at City Hall as Berkley and Councilwoman Shondra Summers-Armstrong took their oath of office. Valley High School’s marching band filled the packed room with lively music, and confetti rained down as Goodman bid farewell at the start of the City Council meeting. “This is a phenomenal woman, and this is so exciting,” Goodman said about the new mayor. “The microphone and City Hall is yours.” “Shelley” chants broke out in the crowd. ‘I pledge to devote my life’ Berkley said she had intended to memorize her speech but had instead been busy learning the ins and outs of running her first meeting. She thanked Carolyn Goodman and Oscar Goodman for leading the City Council for a quarter century before Berkley won November’s runoff election against now-fellow Councilwoman Victoria Seaman. “Twenty five years of dedicated service from one family to any city is extraordinary,” said Berkley, a former U.S. congresswoman. Berkley thanked a plethora of people, including the 14 other candidates who had vied for the mayor’s post. “Thank you so much for running an issue-oriented, civil campaign,” she said. Berkley shared her roots to the city, which began in the early 1960s when her parents packed a car in New York state to move cross country. The young family had only intended to visit Las Vegas for a night, “and we never left.” “I’m very aware of the responsibility that you have entrusted me with,” Berkley said, “and I pledge to devote my life to working on behalf of the city of Las Vegas and the people who have chosen to make this remarkable city their home.” The mayor promised “unprecedented growth and prosperity,” adding: “We’re a world-class tourist destination. We should also be a world-class place to live and raise our families.” Berkley, 73, said in an earlier interview that she was prepared to serve her first four-year term and revisit her energy and well-being before deciding to run for re-election — capping her service at eight years maximum before retiring from elected office. Berkley and Summers-Armstrong inherit a city of nearly 650,000 residents and issues including the ongoing legal battle with the would-be developer of the defunct Badlands golf course , rising homelessness and a critical shortage of affordable housing. They will work alongside Mayor Pro Tem Brian Knudsen, Seaman and Councilwomen Olivia Diaz, Nancy Brune and Francis Allen-Palenske. ‘Let’s get to work’ Summers-Armstrong, who previously served in the Nevada Assembly, won her race to replace Cedric Crear , who did not seek re-election in his unsuccessful run for mayor. “It is really a privilege, and it’s an honor to serve Ward 5 and the city of Las Vegas,” the new councilwoman said. Her ward includes the Historic Westside. “This community is my community,” she said. “It has entrusted in me their hopes and their dreams for growth and jobs and redevelopment and advancement, and I will do my very best to work diligently with you to make these hopes and dreams come true.” She touted her parents, whom she said taught her and her sisters “professional decorum” and ingrained in them faith and a passion for public service. “Let’s get to work and do some really amazing things for Ward 5 and for the city of Las Vegas,” Summers-Armstrong concluded.
As municipalities across Illinois and the country continue to tighten restrictions on where the homeless can sleep, local advocates and service providers asked Chicago officials Wednesday to reconsider the planned closure of one of the city’s largest homeless encampments and not bar people from sleeping in the park in the future. Approximately 30 people are still living in tents scattered across Humboldt Park on the West Side. On Friday, the city plans to clear the encampment, offering its residents “access to support services” as well as the option to move into housing or shelters, a move that has alarmed homeless advocates for its “expedited timeline” and “lack of sufficient “housing pathways,” according to a joint letter sent to the city late last month. Advocates on Wednesday asked that the city not force residents who didn’t yet have a place to go — or who were waiting to move into already-secured permanent housing — out of the park. “The city is displacing people as extreme weather is approaching; (it’s) actually already here,” said Patricia Nix-Hodes, director of the Law Project at the Chicago Coalition to End Homelessness, at a news conference at the park. The Humboldt Park encampment is one of the roughly 100 encampments that have sprung up in recent years as the city contends with a spike in homelessness due to a variety of factors, including a shortage of shelter beds after the pandemic, a lack of affordable housing and the recent migrant crisis that brought tens of thousands of asylum-seekers to Chicago. Friday’s closure is the last step in an 18-month process meant to house the people staying there, although not all the park’s residents have been placed in housing. The neighborhood’s alderman called it the largest effort of its kind in the city’s history. Ordinances that allow fines and possible jail time for people who sleep outside have become increasingly common across the country in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court decision Grants Pass v. Johnson this summer that allowed municipalities to enforce bans on people sleeping outdoors. About a month after the ruling, California Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered state agencies to start removing homeless encampments on state land. About a third of the nation’s homeless population resides in California. In Illinois, Peoria last month became the largest city in the state to pass a measure penalizing public camping , joining north suburban Mundelein, downstate Effingham and suburbs of Peoria, East Peoria and Pekin. Meanwhile, Chicago officials, such as Chief Homelessness Officer Sendy Soto, have ruled that out on the grounds that it would make an already hard-to-reach population even more difficult to care for. On Wednesday, advocates speaking outside what was left of the encampment, littered with yellow clearing notices, said they feared possible criminal enforcement against people who remain in the park Friday. In particular, they said the recent practice of fencing off former tent city sites “mirrors the hollow cruelty of criminalization.” “We do not agree with the practice of closing off public space,” Nix-Hodes said. “The intention is to expedite (the) connection to housing as quickly as possible, not to remove outdoor options for people.” The city has used what is known as an “accelerated moving event,” which condenses the process of placing a person in housing, to shut down tent cities that have sprouted up under viaducts, beside highways and in parks since March 2023. Though homelessness experts and advocates typically support the use of these events as a best practice for helping encampment residents find housing, those who work at Humboldt Park have criticized the process as incomplete, potentially traumatic and harmful to those who might experience homelessness in the future. Workers demolish major homeless encampment by Dan Ryan Expressway ahead of DNC Nix-Hodes and other social workers applauded the city’s efforts to place park dwellers into permanent housing and Fuentes’ work to open new homeless shelters in the neighborhood. According to Fuentes’ office, a total of 106 people who were living in the park have been matched with housing since last year through three accelerated moving events. But Nix-Hodes said Wednesday that not everyone in the park had found housing and even those who had and were waiting to move in could be knocked off-track by Friday’s closure. Of the 63 people who were most recently matched with housing, she estimated that 30 remained in the park as they waited to move into permanent housing. Around 30 more people had no housing option currently on the table, she said.\ Advocates hold up signage as they call on the city to delay clearing the homeless encampment at Humboldt Park during a news conference on Dec. 4, 2024. (Antonio Perez/Chicago Tribune) In a social media post Wednesday, Ald. Jessie Fuentes, 26th, said that claims from advocates that the process had been rushed “overlook the thoughtful planning and trauma-informed outreach that have guided every step of this effort.” “Leaving individuals exposed to harsh winter conditions is not acceptable,” she wrote. Other outreach workers said they were worried about people losing important paperwork, medical supplies or other belongings in the shutdown. They also fear that the park’s closure to the homeless will make it more difficult for social service organizations to help people from access services and possible future chances at permanent housing. “One of the largest barriers to housing people is not being able to find them once a rare housing opportunity becomes available,” said outreach worker Ryan Spangler. Jose Miranda, a Humboldt Park resident who used to live in the park, said preventing people from staying in the park wouldn’t solve the problem of homelessness. “We need some more housing that people can afford, and we need it in neighborhoods that people are familiar with, where they’re going to actually feel safe,” he said. “In the meantime, people need to access public places because there’s nowhere else for them to go.” The city plans to stick with its previously-stated Friday closure date, according to a Wednesday statement from the Department of Family Support Services. City workers are still “providing intensive outreach” to house and shelter the remaining residents and help with documentation, treatment for substance use disorders and other needs, the statement said. Fuentes’ office last week pushed back on characterizations of the closure process as criminalization. In a statement to the Tribune, Fuentes’ chief of staff Juanita García said the office was “committed to a human-centered process that prioritizes support.” Ald. Jessie Fuentes, 26th, during a City Council meeting at City Hall in Chicago on Sept. 18, 2024. (Tess Crowley/Chicago Tribune) “Our focus remains on connecting encampment residents to resources that support their transition to stable living conditions while addressing public safety and public health concerns,” she wrote. Since the summer, the city has cleared a number of homeless encampments as part of a larger initiative to close down such sites and relocate residents to shelters or other housing. Advocates for the homeless, however, have criticized such strategies as insufficient and potentially traumatic for encampment residents, emphasizing that the only solution for homelessness is permanent housing. Chicago Tribune’s Sylvan LeBrun and The Associated Press contributed.
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