POLITICS

Illinois earlier today reported its single highest death count from COVID-19 since the pandemic began — 238 coronavirus deaths, which also marks the highest number of single day fatalities from the disease since May. Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration responded to questions about whether she was involved in a wager over how long the 2019 Chicago Teachers Union strike might last. Her spokeswoman said she did not, but an email obtained by the Tribune lays out a wager that included scotch and cigars. President Donald Trump, meanwhile, teased a White House holiday reception crowd with a 2024 presidential run, The Associated Press is reporting. Welcome to The Spin.

Joe Biden won Illinois by nearly 17 percentage points, 57.4% to 40.7%; Sen. Richard Durbin sailed to re-election over Republican Mark Curran 54.5% to 38.8%; and the graduated income tax fell by a not-insignificant margin of 53.4% to 46.6%. However, break the vote behind those landslides into the smallest electoral pieces — precincts — and a more nuanced picture emerges.

Most companies that have expressed interest in building and operating a Chicago casino would want to do so downtown, according to a summary of responses released by Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration Wednesday. In all, 11 organizations responded to the city’s request for information from interested parties. Eight said the casino should be built in or near downtown, while one preferred a Southeast Side site near Lake Calumet. One didn’t respond, according to the city, which did not specify what each party said.

A spokeswoman said Mayor Lori Lightfoot “does not have any recollection" of an aide's 2019 email about a wager on when the teachers strike would end.

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The city of Chicago expects to begin rolling out vaccines for health care workers later this month and could provide them to lower-risk residents in spring and children by summer, public health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady said Tuesday. The first distribution of vaccines will go toward Chicago hospitals and health care workers, possibly by the third week of December, Arwady said. The city’s also working with long-term care facilities in the city on vaccines, she said.

Two plans designed to slow the destruction of existing buildings in parts of the fast-gentrifying Pilsen neighborhood failed Tuesday, one opposed by the local alderman and one he supported. An ordinance to create a landmark district along a stretch of 18th Street and adjacent streets in the near South Side neighborhood fell unanimously in the Zoning Committee after Ald. Byron Sigcho-Lopez, 25th, spoke against it.

A member of Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan’s Democratic leadership team announced in a letter Monday that she will not support him for another term.

More of the country will be under Chicago’s most severe category for its travel quarantine order, city officials announced Tuesday while bracing for a post-Thanksgiving surge.

Legislation at the heart of the bribery scandal that has ensnared House Speaker Michael Madigan as well as former Commonwealth Edison executives enhanced the utility’s bottom line but failed to produce promised benefits for consumers, according to a report released Tuesday by Illinois PIRG, a public interest advocacy group.

The city of Chicago dismissed the majority of tickets issued to Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s security detail by red-light and speed cameras, including some that were recorded at times when the mayor was scheduled to be attending noncity events, records show.

During a video call on Thursday, Vice President-Elect Kamala Harris thanked University of Chicago Medical Center nurse Talisa Hardin for tirelessly treating COVID-19 patients — for “everything you do every day,” according to a video posted on Harris’ Instagram account. Harris wrote that she and her husband called Hardin and other front-line workers on Thanksgiving “to thank them for everything they have done in the fight against COVID-19. We won’t be able to get through this without them.”

Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart has tested positive for COVID-19, according to a news release from his office.

Biden is making sweeping promises to LGBTQ activists, proposing to carry out virtually every major proposal on their wish lists.

Milwaukee County completed its recount of presidential ballots Friday, finding only small changes in vote totals for one of the two Wisconsin counties recounting ballots, but President Donald Trump’s attorneys appear ready for a legal challenge.

President Donald Trump said Thursday that he will leave the White House if the Electoral College formalizes President-Elect Joe Biden's victory — even as he insisted such a decision would be a “mistake.”

A cache of emails released Wednesday in the Illinois House probe of Speaker Michael Madigan provides a deeper look into how a close confidant pressed Commonwealth Edison on positions ranging from a seat on the utility’s board of directors to student internships.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker notified the Federal Reserve on Wednesday that Illinois plans to borrow an additional $2 billion from a special lending program established earlier this year to aid state and local governments ailing because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Welcome to The Spin, the Chicago Tribune's politics newsletter.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot scored a relatively narrow but important victory Tuesday as the City Council adopted her $12.8 billion budget for 2021 that relies on a property tax hike and controversial debt refinancing to help close a massive deficit.

Chicago aldermen on Tuesday narrowly approved Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s $12.8 billion “pandemic budget” for 2021, a package that will fund city government through the next fiscal year while closing a projected $1.2 billion budget deficit fueled by coronavirus pandemic-driven revenue losses to municipal coffers. Among other things, the package includes a $94 million property tax hike, as well as increases in fees and fines. Here are five things to know.