Amy Qin
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amyqin.bsky.social
Amy Qin
@amyqin.bsky.social
data reporter at WBEZ
Reposted by Amy Qin
IT'S TIIIIIIIIIIME!!! December is here, which means the inaugural 2025 #FOIAdvent calendar has arrived. ☃️✨

Every day this month, the calendar will update with a new records request prompt for you to file with an agency of your choosing, for a fun run of holiday FOIA requests. bit.ly/31-days-of-f...
The Very Official 2025 FOIA Advent Calendar
bit.ly
December 1, 2025 at 7:06 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
Follow along at 3 p.m. CT today www.reddit.com/r/chicago/co...
December 5, 2025 at 3:58 PM
USCIS is hiring “Homeland Defenders” to scrutinize applications for immigration benefits using an ad that features Trump extolling his “America First” agenda over a montage of historical clips of white immigrants. From @schuba.bsky.social

chicago.suntimes.com/the-watchdog...
Agency was created to help immigrants. Now, it's being turned against them.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has given employees law enforcement powers, arrests during immigration appointments have surged, and thousands have applied to become "Homeland Defenders" who...
chicago.suntimes.com
December 5, 2025 at 3:56 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
Two Chicago cops were recently promoted despite investigators finding sexual misconduct. An @invisible.institute and @propublica.org investigation published in the Sun-Times found the Chicago Police Department has ignored repeated calls to address this decades-long issue.
Chicago Police Department promoted 2 cops after investigators found they engaged in sexual misconduct
chicago.suntimes.com
December 4, 2025 at 6:56 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
Want to know how Midway Blitz affected attendance at your Chicago Public School. Look it up here: www.wbez.org/education/20...
As immigration agents swept Chicago this fall, communities stepped in to get kids to school safely
A WBEZ analysis finds student attendance briefly plummeted following intense moments of immigration enforcement, but overall rates are comparable to last year. Some credit “magic school buses” and oth...
www.wbez.org
December 2, 2025 at 12:19 PM
CPS attendance data tells a mixed story this fall. It's apparent fear did keep some students home for days. But also apparent is the steely determination of parents, teenagers, teachers and communities that children should be in school.
w/ @sskedreporter.bsky.social
www.wbez.org/education/20...
December 3, 2025 at 3:28 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
A 6-year-old boy is missing after ICE arrested him and his dad in NYC last week and shipped them off to separate facilities. www.thecity.nyc/2025/12/02/i... @thecity.nyc @gwynnefitz.bsky.social
ICE Arrested and Separated Chinese Father From 6-Year-Old Son, Advocates Say
The father and son were detained at an ICE check-in on Nov. 26, advocates say. The son’s location is currently unknown, while the father is being held at an upstate ICE facility.
www.thecity.nyc
December 2, 2025 at 5:42 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
When immigration agents swept through Chicago, many feared school attendance would plummet. Overall attendance rates are similar to last fall, but there were big unusual drops after intense periods of enforcement, @sskedreporter.bsky.social & @amyqin.bsky.social report www.wbez.org/education/20...
As immigration agents swept Chicago this fall, communities stepped in to get kids to school safely
A WBEZ analysis finds student attendance briefly plummeted following intense moments of immigration enforcement, but overall rates are comparable to last year. Some credit “magic school buses” and oth...
www.wbez.org
December 2, 2025 at 6:23 PM
One in four people in Chicago face food insecurity.

@katpham.bsky.social
and Tara Mobasher put together a very helpful guide for where to find free hot meals in Chicago(by ZIP code!!) borderlessmag.org/2025/11/24/c...
Where Can I Find Free Food in Chicago? – Resources – Borderless Magazine NFP
Where Can I Find Free Food in Chicago? – Resources – Borderless Magazine NFP
borderlessmag.org
November 26, 2025 at 9:42 PM
ICYMI: What happened when wealthy, CA owners bought a public housing development, collected federal $$ and ran it to the ground.

Also in this story: the Dodgers, Ferris Bueller's Day off, and several other 80s movie references...

w/ @estheryjkang.bsky.social

www.wbez.org/housing/2025...
What happened when Sausage King of Chicago bought a South Side housing complex?
The landlord has gotten millions in federal rent subsidies even as tenants complain about years of poor maintenance and deplorable conditions.
www.wbez.org
November 26, 2025 at 3:22 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
A new day, a new @chicago.suntimes.com morning news roundup. ☕

Today's lead: The Sausage King's squalid South Side complex chicago.suntimes.com/morning-edit...
The Sausage King's squalid South Side complex
Plus: A mom inspires a congressional bill on maternal health care, a snowy owl surprise and more.
chicago.suntimes.com
November 26, 2025 at 2:20 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
Exclusive: FEMA and Illinois officials pulled dozens of personnel back from surveying flood-damaged neighborhoods in Chicago because immigration agents were conducting patrols nearby, messages show.
With ICE in the area, FEMA workers were pulled from storm damage work
The decision to halt disaster assessment work came amid the immigration crackdown in Chicago. Officials worried FEMA’s efforts could put residents and surveyors at risk.
www.washingtonpost.com
November 25, 2025 at 5:45 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
NEW: Federal prison workers are jumping ship & heading to ICE for better pay + bonuses. Already BOP lost >1400 people this year, reversing all of 2024’s staffing gains. It’s an unintended consequence of Trump’s push for mass deportations

My 1st for @propublica.org
www.propublica.org/article/ice-...
As Federal Prisons Run Low on Food and Toilet Paper, Corrections Officers Leave in Droves for ICE
Many of the problems the agency is facing now are not new, but staff and prisoners fear an exodus of officers could make life behind bars even worse.
www.propublica.org
November 21, 2025 at 6:38 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
A stunning visual of Chicago's 20-year death gap, mapped on the L, via @myersjustinc.bsky.social @chicago.suntimes.com. Here's what residents & community leaders are doing to close this gap: tinyurl.com/47r2vcj5 @wbez.org @chjreportinghealth.bsky.social @watchdogdiva.bsky.social @kffhealthnews.org
November 21, 2025 at 5:31 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
NEW — Today, Cook County became the first county in the U.S. to establish permanent funding for guaranteed income at the county level.

The Cook County Board of Commissioners approved $7.5 million for the program through its FY 2026 budget, which totals $10.12 billion.

thetriibe.com/2025/11/cook...
Cook County becomes the first county in the US to establish permanent funding for guaranteed income  • The TRiiBE
On Thursday, the Cook County Board of Commissioners approved the FY 2026 budget, which includes $7.5 million to fund the county’s guaranteed basic income program.
thetriibe.com
November 20, 2025 at 11:47 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
As we research the candidates to create our next judicial election guide, we need your help. Have any of the candidates been your attorney or judge? Take a look at the list of candidates and send us your tips. buff.ly/DlOqYRA
airtable.com
November 18, 2025 at 11:00 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
As I read this, I'm thinking about the man I interviewed who had to be hospitalized from the Covid he caught at the poultry processing plant and he got fired for it and he still has long Covid
During the height of the pandemic, Tyson used Palantir to predict Covid-19 infections among meatpacking workers down to a nearly exactly figure. But rather than using this data to increase worker protections, Tyson used it plan for labor shortages + plant closures
My latest for @sentientmedia.org
November 14, 2025 at 5:39 AM
Reposted by Amy Qin
Tear gas, car crashes, chokeholds: Risky tactics drive Trump’s #Chicago deportation blitz. Law enforcement experts say federal agents show a lack of training and restraint. “They’re out of control,” ex-CPD Supt. Garry McCarthy sez. @chicago.suntimes.com @wbez.org chicago.suntimes.com/the-watchdog...
Tear gas, car crashes, rubber bullets: Risky tactics have driven Trump’s Chicago deportation ‘blitz’
Law enforcement experts say federal agents have displayed a lack of training and restraint. “They’re out of control,” ex-police Supt. Garry McCarthy says.
chicago.suntimes.com
November 14, 2025 at 1:58 PM
This week, DHS claimed they were responsible for a "historic drop in crime" in Chicago, citing numbers but no sources.

@araceligomezaldana.bsky.social and I fact-checked that claim.

Our analysis shows the blitz had little impact on an ongoing decline in violent crime.
www.wbez.org/data/2025/11...
November 14, 2025 at 3:16 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
DHS confirmed it has stopped automatically storing officials' text messages.

Instead, officials are supposed to take a screenshot, send that to their work email, download it onto their work computer and run a text-recognition program on it. Every time.

www.nytimes.com/2025/11/06/u...
November 7, 2025 at 3:23 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
Feds deploy tear gas in Albany Park as neighbors respond to them detaining people. One person was taken, though another was freed.

“I was afraid to go over there. I got braver the more people came out. I know my neighbors have my back, and I have their back."
Feds deploy tear gas in another Chicago neighborhood: 'We chased federal agents out of Albany Park today'
A federal judge’s temporary restraining order requires federal agents to issue two warnings before using riot control weapons such as tear gas. Witnesses says they didn't get any warning.
chicago.suntimes.com
October 12, 2025 at 11:37 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
NEW: There’s a disaster unfolding in Alaska right now. And no major network is covering it.

The remnants of Typhoon Halong battered western Alaska overnight. Homes, with people in them, have literally been swept into the Bering Strait.

At least 20 are missing. No comment from any federal agency.
October 13, 2025 at 3:48 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
NEWS: ICE gave a Rogers Park man a $130 ticket for not having his papers on him. They rounded him up last week and eventually let him go, but not without a fine that some critics say is un-American. Trump admin enforcing little-used law
www.chicagotribune.com/2025/10/13/i...
ICE tickets Chicago man with legal residency $130 for not having his papers on him: ‘It’s not fair…I’m a resident’
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement fined Rueben Antonio Cruz $130 for not having his papers with him.
www.chicagotribune.com
October 13, 2025 at 5:03 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
I'm at the scene where ICE abducted multiple people from Lincoln and Foster this morning.

A WGN producer was among the people taken, allegedly because she was among a group of bystanders who tried to intervene. ICE agents hit this car while making their getaway.
October 10, 2025 at 2:55 PM
Reposted by Amy Qin
Neighbor shielded 7-year-old during South Shore federal raid: ‘I didn’t want them to take her’ via @chicago.suntimes.com
October 10, 2025 at 5:08 PM