Por TIM SULLIVAN

MINNEAPOLIS, Minnesota, EE.UU. (AP) — Incluso para un presidente que ha dejado claro durante mucho tiempo que no es fanático de Somalia, los más recientes comentarios despectivos provenientes de la Casa Blanca fueron un shock para la comunidad somalí más grande de Estados Unidos.

“No contribuyen en nada. No los quiero en nuestro país”, afirmó el presidente estadounidense Donald Trump a periodistas durante una reunión del gabinete el martes. “Podemos ir por un camino o por otro, y vamos a ir por el camino equivocado si seguimos aceptando basura en nuestro país”.

“Los somalíes deberían estar fuera de aquí. Han destruido nuestro país”, comentó Trump el miércoles.

Hamse Warfe, un ciudadano estadounidense del área metropolitana de Minneapolis que nació en Somalia y ha fundado una serie de negocios exitosos, ve las cosas de manera diferente.

“No soy basura”, expresó Warfe, quien ahora dirige una organización educativa sin fines de lucro a nivel nacional: World Savvy.

“Las palabras importan mucho, especialmente cuando es el presidente de Estados Unidos quien está hablando”, manifestó, eligiendo cuidadosamente sus propias palabras.

El área metropolitana de Minneapolis-St. Paul es hogar de aproximadamente 84.000 personas de ascendencia somalí, quienes representan casi un tercio de los somalíes que viven en Estados Unidos.

Los refugiados de la nación del este de África han estado llegando a las frías llanuras de Minnesota desde la década de 1990, atraídos por los generosos servicios sociales del estado y una comunidad de la diáspora somalí en constante crecimiento.

Se han vuelto cada vez más prominentes en el estado, sirviendo en los consejos municipales de Minneapolis y St. Paul y en la legislatura estatal. La representante federal demócrata Ilhan Omar –un objetivo frecuente de Trump, quien el martes la tachó específicamente de “basura”– representa parte del estado en la Cámara de Representantes de Estados Unidos.

Los comentarios de Trump se produjeron días después de que su administración anunciara que suspendería todas las decisiones de asilo luego de que dos soldados de la Guardia Nacional fueran baleados en Washington. El sospechoso del ataque es originario de Afganistán, pero Trump ha utilizado el momento para plantear preguntas sobre inmigrantes de otras naciones, incluida Somalia.

Trump habló poco después de que se informara que las autoridades federales están preparando una operación de inmigración en Minnesota que se centraría principalmente en inmigrantes somalíes que viven ilegalmente en Estados Unidos, según una persona familiarizada con la planificación.

La mayoría de los somalíes del estado son ciudadanos estadounidenses, muchos de ellos de nacimiento.

Trump prometió la semana pasada en una publicación en redes sociales enviar a los somalíes “de regreso a de donde vinieron”, y alegó que Minnesota es “un centro de lavado de dinero”.

Más tarde el martes, el gobierno estadounidense dijo que pausaría todas las solicitudes de inmigración, como las solicitudes de residencia permanente para personas de 19 países, a las cuales se les vetó la entrada a Estados Unidos como parte de los cambios de inmigración tras el tiroteo en DC.

Los líderes de la comunidad somalí local, así como aliados como el gobernador Tim Walz y el alcalde de Minneapolis Jacob Frey, también han rechazado a quienes podrían culpar a la comunidad somalí en general por casos recientes de fraude masivo en programas públicos.

Prometieron proteger a la comunidad somalí de la ciudad.

“Minneapolis es, y seguirá siendo, una ciudad que defiende a nuestros residentes”, afirmó Frey en un comunicado el miércoles.

___

El periodista de The Associated Press Steve Karnowski contribuyó a este despacho. ___

Esta historia fue traducida del inglés por un editor de AP con la ayuda de una herramienta de inteligencia artificial generativa.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/03/el-desprecio-del-presidente-trump-impacta-a-la-mayor-comunidad-somal-de-eeuu/ 

“What The F**k Just Happened?” Homeless Man Violently Attacks NYU Student Walking To Class

Tyler Durden
Wed, 12/03/2025 – 18:50

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/what-fk-just-happened-homeless-man-violently-attacks-nyu-student-walking-class 

The gravel of a funeral home parking lot could be heard crunching under the feet of two public officials from suburban Summit as they left a wake to privately compare notes on a worrisome federal bribery investigation.

During the March 2022 conversation, John Kosmowski, the Summit police chief, tried to tell his colleague and frequent drinking buddy, then-Public Works Director Bill Mundy, that a cash payment they’d received from a bar owner five years earlier was just a loan — and that neither he nor Mundy pulled any strings to get the owner’s liquor license transferred.

“Kris gave me the money as a loan. I gave you $3,000 because just, in general principle, you need the money,” Kosmowski said to Mundy, who was secretly wearing a wire for the FBI.

“You think anybody’s gonna buy that?” Mundy replied. “I love you like a brother, but this is (expletive) up.”

Kosmowski, though, warned that the feds were closing in and it was important for them to be on the same page.

“There’s a statute of limitations coming up — that means that they’re going to be indicting soon,” Kosmowski said. “Here’s the thing, no matter what we say, remember this: It’s gonna be their version against ours. It always is. It was a loan from me to you. That was that.”

The 15-minute conversation took center stage Wednesday in a federal courtroom in Chicago, where Kosmowski is on trial on charges of bribery and obstruction of justice. It was played during the direct examination of Mundy, who pleaded guilty in 2023 and is the prosecution’s star witness.

While the charges were relatively low-level, the case was an offshoot of a larger corruption probe that netted indictments against then-state Sen. Martin Sandoval and a slew of other suburban elected officials, police chiefs and political operatives allegedly on the take.

Jurors heard a number of names from that investigation Wednesday, including Omar Maani — the red-light camera company executive who also wore a wire for the FBI — who Mundy said paid him bribes to help find properties to buy in Summit.

Mundy also told investigators he took money from now-deceased developer Boris Nitchoff, who was implicated in parallel bribery investigations into former Chicago Ald. Carrie Austin and employees of the Cook County Assessor’s Office.

Mundy and Kosmowski, meanwhile, were charged in an indictment in 2022 with conspiring to accept $10,000 from the owner of the Fire Station Pub in Summit in exchange for helping secure the transfer of a liquor license to a relative.

According to prosecutors, Kosmowski received the bribe payment from the owner, Kris Hodurek, in March 2017 and then gave Mundy his $5,000 cut later that day. In the meantime, Mundy called Summit Mayor Sergio Rodriguez and, with Kosmowski listening in, urged the mayor to approve the transfer, the charges alleged. Rodriguez has not been charged with any wrongdoing.

In opening statements Tuesday, Kosmowski’s attorney, Gabrielle Sansonetti, told jurors that Mundy cannot be trusted.

Sansonetti called him an alcoholic and drug abuser who was offering his own self-interested interpretation of conversations in order to get a deal from prosecutors on a host of schemes he allegedly pulled in his years as a building inspector and public works director.

She also warned that wiretapped recordings are only as reliable as the witness who interprets them.

“Think of an interpreter who is drunk, who forgets the right words, who can’t remember the language, who was caught committing other crimes,” Sansonetti said. “You would not trust the interpretations that you got. And you should not trust Bill Mundy.”

Sansonetti said at the time Kosmowski took the money from Hodurek, his daughter was going off to college and he was worried about making the first tuition payment. So he did what many in the tight-knit Polish immigrant community do — he turned to a friend for financial help, she said.

Hodurek, who also cooperated with the investigation, pleaded guilty in October to collecting $115,000 in fraudulent unemployment benefits and is expected to testify against Kosmowski later in the trial.
“It was a small loan from one member of the immigrant community to another to help his kid be better in this world,” Sansonetti told the jury.

Mundy, 62, whose lengthy career in Summit and knowledge of the village’s inner workings earned him status as “unofficial mayor,” took jurors Wednesday through a series of wiretapped calls and other evidence, including a 2017 meeting at a cul-de-sac street on Chicago’s Southwest Side where the FBI was watching as Kosmowski handed him $5,000 in cash in a cup.

A large chunk of Mundy’s direct testimony centered on the conversation he recorded outside the funeral home in southwest suburban Justice in 2022, more than two years after he first began cooperating with the feds.

“We had attended a wake, and on the way out, John stopped me and asked if we could have a conversation in the parking lot,” Mundy testified.

Mundy said Kosmowski wanted to go over the details of the ongoing federal investigation, which had recently heated up with a flurry of grand jury subpoenas. During the conversation, Kosmowski repeatedly “tried to classify the transaction” with Hodurek as a loan, Mundy testified.

“It was kind of a tough conversation,” he told the jury. “I think he was trying to get me to look at it his way. I just explained that the facts are the facts…and trying to make up some story about a loan was just not gonna fly.”

In the expletive-laden conversation, Kosmowski told Mundy there was no way they could’ve helped Hodurek with any licensing because it was not in their power to do so. Kosmowski also said he suspected Hodurek was wearing a wire for the feds when he came to Kosmowski’s house the previous Thanksgiving and told him “two FBI guys” had been asking him about the money.

“I says, ‘Well, tell them you loaned me money. I paid you back, and that’s it. End of story,’” Kosmowski told Mundy on the recording.

Later, Mundy asked, “What if the (expletive) on the tape doesn’t corroborate what you just said?”

“Well, I’d like to hear the tape, because I know I never talked about money for licensing with Kris,” Kosmowski said. “…I specifically remember, I says, ‘Listen, you got a problem with your licensing, you have to contact the mayor, make an appointment, and you have to ask him what you can do,’ and that was it. I says “Kris, that’s out of my league. I can’t help you there.”

Mundy testified that while it was true he and Kosmowski could not “officially” get a liquor license approved, they could — and did — pull strings with the mayor to get things done.

To bolster that point, prosecutors played a wiretapped call from 2017 where Kosmowski and Mundy talked about the status of several taverns in Summit, including one that they wanted to see remained closed.

“Now do they know in the office not to renew his license?” Mundy said on the call. “You might want to send a memo over there when he comes in to pay for it. He shouldn’t get it.”

Kosmowski replied that he would make sure officials in Summit were aware. “(Expletive) him. He needs to be closed as far as I’m concerned,” he said on the call.

In her direct examination, Assistant U.S. Attorney Tiffany Ardam asked Mundy whether it was true that the money they took from Hodurek was a loan. Mundy said it was not.

So why did they help out Hodurek?

“Uh, we did it for the cash,” Mundy said. That’s what I recall.”

On cross-examination, Mundy acknowledged abusing both alcohol and cocaine while he was under investigation as well as after he was charged, which was a violation of his pretrial release conditions.

Sansonetti also grilled Mundy on the bribes he allegedly admitted taking over his 30 years as a building inspector, including one instance when a developer threw cash into his car for helping him get a construction contract and another where a real estate magnate paid for trips to Florida and Panama.

“Sometimes if I did somebody a favor, they would give me money, but I wouldn’t take money up front to pass an inspection,” Mundy testified. “I guess it’s technically a bribe, but it wasn’t like I was shaking them down for the money

More like a gratuity? Sansonetti asked.

“Nah, not really. It’s all a crime,” he said.

jmeisner@chicagotribune.com

https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/03/undercover-tape-bribery-trial-summit-police-chief/ 

Federal prosecutors moved Wednesday to drop charges against a comedy club manager accused of shutting a car door on a federal immigration agent’s leg in the Lakeview neighborhood, the latest in a string of dismissals in high-profile cases that resulted from the Trump administration’s so-called Operation Midway Blitz.

Nathan Griffin, 24, was charged in late October with assaulting, impeding or interfering with a federal officer during one of many skirmishes between federal agents and U.S. citizens that punctuated the Trump administration’s wave of illegal immigration enforcement in and around Chicago.

Most federal agents have moved on from Chicago, while criminal cases against U.S. citizens that arose from their time here have continued to move through the legal system. But many of those charges have disintegrated only weeks after being filed.

Griffin’s family declined to comment on the dismissal and his attorney didn’t immediately respond

U.S. Customs and Border Protection Agent Paul Delgado, whom Griffin had been accused of injuring, testified in a preliminary examination last month that when he and a group of other agents had just conducted an arrest at Belmont Avenue and Broadway in the Lakeview neighborhood when they mistakenly thought one of the other agents had dropped his body camera and returned to the scene in two separate cars.

Delgado testified that he saw a crowd of people forming around the other vehicle and tried to get out of the car when Griffin allegedly slammed the door back on his leg. Agents then tackled Griffin and took him into custody, leading to a videotaped car ride in which Griffin, apparently well aware he was being filmed, unleashed a steady stream of invective about his opinion of the blitz and the agents carrying it out. One of the agents, several minutes into the tirade, told Griffin to “relax.”

“Relax?,” Griffin asked in response. “You guys are abducting people off the streets! Relax?”

“No comment,” said one of the agents in the back seat.

“Oh, no comment,” Griffin repeated. “No comment.”

The agent riding in the front passenger seat radioed that the car was on Sheridan Road, mispronouncing Sheridan as “Shirden.” The agent driving the car said they were at Sheridan and Belmont before Griffin interjected again.

“We’re on the corner of (expletive) and (expletive),” he said. “Oh, and also there is a (expletive) sad (expletive) jerk off sitting right beside me, holding my arm. The only human contact he’s ever gonna feel for the rest of his (expletive) life.”

The motion to scrap the case against Griffin without prejudice follows prosecutors’ move to drop charges against Marimar Martinez, the 30-year-old woman who was shot five times by a Border Patrol agent in Brighton Park who claimed Martinez “rammed” a federal vehicle with her own car in an Oct. 4 standoff.

In a nine-page opinion regarding another one of those cases, against a U.S veteran charged with assault, U.S. Magistrate Judge Gabriel Fuentes wrote he could not “help but note just how unusual and possibly unprecedented it is” for Chicago’s venerable U.S. attorney’s office to bring charges “so hastily” that, once more facts came out, they were unable to obtain an indictment in the grand jury or were forced to dismiss the case as not provable.

Only a handful of people are still facing charges for their actions in opposition to the blitz. Among them is the congressional candidate and digital creator Katherine “Kat” Abughazaleh, who has been accused of conspiracy along with several other local political figures for their actions outside a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement processing center in a west suburb. All of the “Broadview Six” have pleaded not guilty.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/03/charges-dropped-comedy-club-manager/ 

A Manhattan judge has ordered OpenAI to provide the Chicago Tribune and other news outlets with millions of anonymous chats between ChatGPT and its users in a major ongoing copyright infringement case.

In a nine-page order made public Wednesday, Manhattan Magistrate Judge Ona Wang denied OpenAI’s request to reconsider her November ruling requiring the tech giant to hand over 20 million ChatGPT output logs to the media outlets.

The newspapers want to analyze a sample of ChatGPT’s consumer logs to test its language-learning model to see whether and how it’s propagating journalists’ work.

The ruling comes in a major consolidated class-action lawsuit against Microsoft and OpenAI initiated in 2023, in which The New York Times, Chicago Tribune, The New York Daily News and affiliated outlets with Tribune Publishing and MediaNews Group allege the artificial intelligence company is stealing and distorting their copyrighted works. The Authors Guild and a litany of best-selling writers are also parties in the complex litigation.

“OpenAI’s leadership was hallucinating when they thought they could get away with withholding evidence about how their business model relies on stealing from hardworking journalists, and we look forward to holding them accountable for their ongoing misappropriation of our work. They should pay for the copyright-protected work they use to build and maintain their apps and products, and they know it,” said Frank Pine, Executive Editor of MediaNews Group and Tribune Publishing, in a statement.

A spokesperson for OpenAI pointed to a blog post by company executive Dane Stuckey after Wang’s original order on the matter. “We will continue to explore every option available to protect our users’ privacy,” the statement read in part.

But in the decision, Wang reaffirmed that users’ privacy was not in jeopardy, noting that OpenAI had almost completed an internal process to anonymize the chats. Also mitigating privacy risks raised by OpenAI are the “multiple layers of protection in this case precisely because of the highly sensitive and private nature of much of the discovery that is exchanging hands,” the judge wrote.

She found the A.I. conversations were “clearly relevant” to the news outlets’ claims that they contain partial or complete reproductions of their copyrighted works and to OpenAI’s defense that they contain other user activity.

“News Plaintiffs are entitled to discovery on both,” the judge wrote.

“Production of the 20 Million ChatGPT Logs is also proportional to the needs of the case. The total universe of retained consumer output logs is in the tens of billions. The 20 million sample here represents less than 0.05% of the total logs that OpenAI has retained in the ordinary course of business.”

Wang wrote that once the tech behemoth has completed the deidentification process, it will have 7 days to hand over the data. OpenAI has also appealed Wang’s November order to Manhattan Federal Judge Sidney Stein, the district judge overseeing the case.

The sizable 20 million chats represent a fraction of the billions of output logs ChatGPT has retained, Wang noted in her Wednesday order.

Steven Lieberman, an attorney for MediaNews Group and Tribune Publishing, in a statement pointed to Wang’s finding that OpenAI had withheld “critically important evidence” when it was first requested and rejected the tech giant’s arguments to the contrary.

“The Court also raised the issue of whether OpenAI’s efforts to delay production of the ChatGPT logs was motivated by an improper purpose, saying of the two possible explanations for OpenAI’s behavior: [n]either bode well for OpenAI.”

https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/03/openai-chatgpt-conversations/ 

Judge Restricts Immigration Arrests In DC

Tyler Durden
Wed, 12/03/2025 – 18:25

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/judge-restricts-immigration-arrests-dc 

Por ELÉONORE HUGHES y LUCAS DUMPHREYS

RÍO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Las imponentes palmas talipot que se encuentran en un parque de Río de Janeiro están floreciendo por primera y única vez en sus vidas, después de que fueron introducidas al país por el famoso arquitecto brasileño Roberto Burle Marx en la década de 1960.

Hacia el final de su vida –que puede durar entre 40 y 80 años– la palma presenta una pluma central llena de millones de pequeñas flores de color blanco y crema que se elevan por encima de sus hojas en forma de abanico.

El raro fenómeno que conecta el pasado con el presente ha despertado la curiosidad de los transeúntes en el Parque Flamengo, quienes se detienen y levantan la mirada para admirarlas y tomar fotos.

Vinicius Vanni, un ingeniero civil de 42 años, incluso esperaba recoger algunas semillas para poder plantarlas.

“Probablemente no las veré florecer, pero estarán allí para las generaciones futuras”, expresó desde el Parque Flamengo, que bordea una playa cercana y ofrece una vista espectacular del Pan de Azúcar.

Originaria del sur de India y Sri Lanka, la palma talipot puede alcanzar hasta 30 metros de altura y producir alrededor de 25 millones de flores gracias a la energía acumulada durante décadas.

Una vez que las flores son polinizadas, producen frutos que pueden convertirse en plántulas.

Además del Parque Flamengo, también se pueden encontrar palmeras talipot en el Jardín Botánico de Río, donde también están floreciendo.

Esto se debe a que fueron traídas desde el sur de Asia al mismo tiempo, tienen el mismo metabolismo y han estado expuestas al mismo ritmo brasileño de luz diurna, según Aline Saavedra, bióloga de la Universidad Estatal de Río de Janeiro.

Saavedra comentó que existen leyes ambientales que regulan estrictamente el transporte de especies nativas de otro continente, aunque las palmas talipot no son consideradas como especies invasivas debido a su lento desarrollo.

El interés que ha generado el fenómeno es positivo y podría fomentar un sentido de pertenencia para que los seres humanos preserven el medio ambiente en lugar de destruirlo, subrayó Saavedra.

“Esta especie de palma nos ofrece una reflexión sobre la temporalidad, porque tiene más o menos la misma esperanza de vida que un ser humano”, señaló Saavedra. “Marx también quería transmitir una perspectiva poética.”

___

Esta historia fue traducida del inglés por un editor de AP con la ayuda de una herramienta de inteligencia artificial generativa.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/03/imponentes-palmeras-en-ro-de-janeiro-florecen-por-primera-y-nica-vez/ 

BERLÍN (AP) — Harry Kane anotó su 25to gol de la temporada con el Bayern Múnich y concedió un penalti al llevar a su equipo a los cuartos de final de la Copa de Alemania con una victoria de 3-2 sobre el Union Berlín el miércoles.

Bayern tomó la delantera con un gol en propia puerta de Ilyas Ansah del Union antes de que Kane cabeceara el segundo tanto del Bayern en un córner a los 23 minutos.

Una mano del defensa del Bayern Jonathan Tah permitió a Leopold Querfeld devolver a su equipo al juego con un penalti antes de que otro gol en propia puerta, esta vez de Diogo Leite, restaurara la diferencia de dos para el Bayern.

Querfeld anotó de nuevo desde el punto de penalti cuando el árbitro juzgó que Kane había usado su codo al saltar por el balón. El defensa austríaco casi logró un triplete al final cuando envió un cabezazo que pasó rozando el poste.

Bayern está en los cuartos de final por primera vez desde la temporada 2022-23. No ha superado esa etapa desde que ganó el trofeo en 2020.

Bayern sigue invicto en 15 partidos contra equipos alemanes esta temporada. El único partido que no ganó fue un empate 2-2 con el Union en la Bundesliga el mes pasado.

El centrocampista del Bayern, Aleksandar Pavlovic, salió cojeando con una aparente lesión en la pierna izquierda a los 49 minutos.

Stuttgart avanza

La defensa de la Copa de Alemania del Stuttgart continuó con una victoria de 2-0 sobre el Bochum para avanzar a los cuartos de final después de un partido desastroso para el defensor del Bochum, Philipp Strompf.

Stuttgart tomó la ventaja a los 12 minutos cuando Strompf cabeceó un saque de banda largo más allá de su propio portero, y Strompf fue expulsado justo antes del descanso. Perdió el balón ante Deniz Undav y luego cometió falta sobre Undav cuando el delantero del Stuttgart de otro modo habría estado frente al gol.

Undav duplicó la ventaja del Stuttgart con un cabezazo poco después del descanso y su equipo navegó hacia la victoria sobre el Bochum de segunda división desde allí.

Freiburgo venció al Darmstadt de segunda división 2-0 con un penalti de Vincenzo Grifo y otro gol de Lucas Höler. Grifo lanzó un segundo penalti contra el travesaño al final del partido.

Holstein Kiel de la segunda división sorprendió al Hamburger SV de primera en los penaltis después de casi ser eliminado en el tiempo extra. El gol de Phil Harres a los 118 minutos mantuvo a Kiel en el partido después del gol de Bakery Jatta para el Hamburger.

___

Deportes en español AP: https://apnews.com/hub/deportes

https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/03/harry-kane-anota-y-bayern-vence-a-union-berlin-para-avanzar-a-cuartos-de-la-copa-de-alemania/ 

Recent job cuts at Marquee Sports Network led to widescale panic from Chicago Cubs fans only days before the MLB winter meetings are set to convene in Orlando, Fla.

According to various blogs and websites, by laying off the Marquee general manager and the content creators at the website, the Cubs were signaling another offseason of cost-cutting, which obviously would affect their spending on free agency.

Memories of 2020, when Cubs President Jed Hoyer nontendered Kyle Schwarber, were still fresh in many fans’ minds. “Is this going to be another winter of our discontent?”

We won’t really know until the Cubs begin making some significant moves, assuming they will do something once the market heats up next week in Florida. The signing of reliever Phil Maton to a two-year, $14.5 million deal with an option was fine, but only one small step in creating a new back end of the bullpen.

Another starter is also necessary, but with Shota Imanaga back in the fold after shockingly accepting the team’s $22 million qualifying offer, the Cubs have their four main starters returning, plus swingman Colin Rea. Rehabbing Justin Steele should be back at some point as well.

I can’t say what the Cubs will do. Hoyer likes to surprise people, as he did last year in acquiring Kyle Tucker. But I’m guessing the Marquee Sports cost-cutting moves won’t significantly affect Hoyer’s ability to spend this winter. It will save the Cubs money, obviously, but the combined salaries of the employees laid off probably would be a fragment of what’s needed to sign a midlevel reliever to a one-year deal.

A Cubs source on Wednesday confirmed a Sun-Times report that Marquee reporter Andy Martinez and content director Tony Andracki were let go, along with GM Diane Penny. But the source said it was not going to affect the station’s primary goal, which of course is broadcasting Cubs games.

“Fans are going to see the same talent next year,” the source said, adding the decision are just a renewed “focus on the live broadcast.”

So the broadcast team of Jon “Boog” Sciambi, Jim Deshaies and Taylor McGregor will all be back, along with Elise Menaker and Cubs insider Bruce Levine.

It appears likely the Marquee website eventually will be void of written content since they got rid of their two main writers, both of whom did a good job under difficult circumstances.  Writing about a team that owns the network you work for can’t be easy.

Cubs President Jed Hoyer walks near the field before Game 5 of the NL Division Series against the Brewers on Oct. 11, 2025, at American Family Field in Milwaukee. (Armando L. Sanchez/Chicago Tribune)

There was no reason given for the decision to go without written Cubs content, and the timing was curious since the winter meetings are a prime outlet for information gathering, which is what Cubs fans crave in the offseason. The Hot Stove League always draws interest because fans want to know whether to be optimistic for the coming season.

No decision has been made on whether the website will continue in 2026. It currently emphasizes Bears content. That decision will be made by a committee that includes the Cubs business operations department and Sinclair, which co-owns the station.

Cubs senior vice president of sales and marketing Colin Faulkner will take on the Marquee general manager duties for the time being, which includes “programming and production.” Faulkner, the husband of Blackhawks executive Jaime Faulkner, declined to comment.

Concerns that the Cubs basically would be eliminating the firewall between the business operations side and the actual broadcast should be alleviated since there was no real firewall to begin with.

The Cubs would not allow something on Marquee that the owners didn’t approve of, as evidenced by the orchestrated return of Sammy Sosa in 2025. Marquee studiously avoided any mention of his alleged use of performance-enhancing drugs. The line is also blurred any time president of business operations Crane Kenney steps foot in the TV booth during games and starts providing his expertise.

So Faulkner can’t really do anything that would add to the perception that the network is just another arm of Cubs management, unless he brings back the panel discussion show “The Reporters,” which once stopped the taping of an episode during which Hoyer was mildly criticized by reporters. The reporters then were told to avoid the subject when they started taping again, and the original segment was edited out. That’s state-run media, baseball-style.

There obviously aren’t any Cubs games to produce until spring training, so Marquee has some time to bring in someone with experience in broadcasting baseball games. If not, Faulkner’s broadcasts will be highly scrutinized.

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Less than two years ago, Penny was named to replace veteran Mike McCarthy, a hands-on GM frequently seen at the ballpark until he resigned because of health issues. Penny, who was seldom seen at Wrigley Field, was more involved in the digital side, which is now being downsized. McCarthy returned to CHSN, where he’s currently the GM in charge of White Sox, Bulls and Blackhawks broadcasts.

Marquee Sports will be entering its seventh season of televising Cubs games in ’26, and fans have varying opinions on the broadcasts and the broadcast team. Some love Sciambi, while others pine for the return of Len Kasper, who left Marquee for the White Sox radio booth. No baseball announcer is universally loved, though Harry Caray came close during his White Sox days when he and Jimmy Piersall teamed up.

Local broadcasts invariably emphasize the positive, and fortunately for Marquee there were many more positives than negatives in ‘25. Still, the broadcasts were extremely touchy-feely with manager Craig Counsell, whose decision-making often rankled fans but was seldom questioned by anyone on Marquee, with the exception of studio analyst Cliff Floyd.

Perhaps the biggest disappointment for Cubs fans, however, is that Marquee’s arrival in 2020 did not lead to the kind of massive revenues they hoped would be put back into the team’s payroll.

“The new TV deal, at least for the first few years, basically means the exact same thing for us as the old deal,” then-President Theo Epstein warned at the end of 2019. “The first few years will basically replicate the old deal, and then with potential for real growth.”

After six seasons, Marquee is still working on that real growth, and some employees paid the price with the loss of their jobs.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/03/chicago-marquee-sports-offseason-plans/