Stories by Associated Press

The jury at Kyle Rittenhouse’s murder trial deliberated a full day on Tuesday without reaching a verdict over whether he was the instigator in a night of bloodshed in Kenosha or a concerned citizen who came under attack while trying to protect property.

Reneisha Jenkins’ direction, along with the wonderfully playful, hip-swiveling choreography of Christopher Chase Carter and the impeccable music direction of keyboardist Diana Lawrence, has infused the show with genuine emotional heat as well as laugh-generating irreverence and comic sparkle.

Chicago has a long history of segregation and racial inequity. Now, a new data analysis by the DePaul University Center for Journalism Integrity & Excellence shows inequity is rooted even in the planting of city trees.

Three mayors in the past 15 years have all promised to combat the effects of global climate change. But some critics and scientists, along with a new data analysis by the DePaul University Center for Journalism Integrity & Excellence, reveal their efforts have fallen short. 

Illinois’ handwritten copy of the historic document once belonged to the guy who was the main speaker at Gettysburg and whose own two-hour oration was followed by Abraham Lincoln’s 272-word masterpiece.  

A special kind of art gallery in Chicago is emerging as a brick-and-mortar trailblazer in the digital art world. The art space imnotArt in Chicago’s Wicker Park neighborhood bills itself as the city’s first physical NFT gallery and one of the first of its kind in the world.

The annual Conference of the Parties, just held for the 26th time, is all about getting countries to gradually ratchet up their measures to defuse global warming.

One week after it was removed from the advisory, officials returned Arkansas to the list of states with high rates of transmission. The advisory includes 38 states as well as Guam, announced Dr. Allison Arwady, the commissioner of the Chicago Department of Public Health.

The company’s filing comes as new infections are rising once again, driven mainly by hot spots in states where colder weather is driving more Americans indoors.

Chicago’s inspector general should conduct “a full factual investigation” of Ald. Jim Gardiner's conduct, the Chicago Board of Ethics determined.

When a fish the size of a 10-year-old child was pulled from the Humboldt Park lagoon earlier this month, the reaction quickly went from “Oooh” to “Uh-oh.” The angler had reeled a whopper of an invasive bighead carp accidentally stocked 20 years ago. Are there more?

City Council remap fight down to the wire. Jurors deliberate in the Kyle Rittenhouse case. Recapping COP26. Chicago climate change promises kept and broken. Exploring an NFT digital art gallery, and more.

It's been a “long time coming, a moment I had been imagining so intensely for so long," a bearded and shaggy-haired Danny Fenster said after landing in New York. "Surpasses everything I had imagined.”

A day after he announced his intention to leave the department, John Catanzara — the first-term president of the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 7 — posted a picture of his personnel action request on his Facebook page, which shows that he has indeed retired from the CPD.

The plastics industry is expected to be putting more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere than coal by the end of this decade according to a recent report by Beyond Plastic, an environmental advocacy group.

“Our goal in public safety is to have children no longer think about being shot at,” said Chris Patterson, who was tapped to lead the newly created Office of Firearm Violence Prevention. “Communities don’t feel safe because of the violence.”

In September, 4.4 million people left their jobs, according to the latest data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Some say workers have spent the pandemic reevaluating their priorities and values, leading them to leave their places of work or demand more from their employers. 

As union contract negotiations wrap at John Deere, the used tractor business sees a boom. Ann Dwyer has details on that story and more.

The $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure plan signed into law Monday by President Joe Biden includes $1.7 billion that will help Chicago “kick-start” lagging efforts to replace lead service lines responsible for contaminating the tap water in homes across the city, Mayor Lori Lightfoot said. 

After a full day of arguments, the jurors were told to return Tuesday morning for the start of deliberations in the case that has stirred fierce debate in the U.S. over guns, vigilantism and law and order.

The stunning announcement comes after John Catanzara, the head of the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 7, spent hours testifying at his own termination hearing Monday.

“It is not surprising to me that he did not want to face accountability for his own conduct,” Mayor Lori Lightfoot said.

The president hopes to use the infrastructure law to build back his popularity, which has taken a hit amid rising inflation and the inability to fully shake the public health and economic risks from COVID-19.

On Monday, the Environmental Protection Agency released its first National Recycling Strategy, which aims for a 50% recycling rate in the U.S. by 2030. 

More than 4,900 members of the Chicago Police Department are not fully vaccinated against COVID-19 or have refused to disclose their vaccination status to city officials, one month after the deadline set by Mayor Lori Lightfoot, according to data released Monday by city officials.

Steve Bannon did not enter a plea Monday and is due back in court on Thursday for the next phase of what could be the first high-level trial in connection with January’s insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.