Daywatch: How far to the right will the Illinois GOP go?

Good morning, Chicago.

More than just picking nominees for governor and other offices, Illinois Republicans’ choices this June 28 primary also will determine the GOP’s future — and, the Tribune’s Rick Pearson reports, whether the state party’s gradual move to the right in recent years will accelerate.

In the Downstate congressional GOP primary between five-term Rep. Rodney Davis and freshman Rep. Mary Miller, the Trump factor looms large.

And this is the latest Illinois has had a primary election since at least the Great Depression. Do voters even know Election Day is coming up, or are their minds already drifting to Wisconsin Dells?

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Ken Griffin’s money expected to again play role in Illinois Supreme Court elections, starting with primary for suburban district seat

The state’s wealthiest man, Citadel CEO Ken Griffin, is again exerting influence in a race for an Illinois Supreme Court seat during an election cycle that could give Republicans a high court edge.

Griffin has funneled $6.25 million to an independent expenditure committee that two years ago spent millions in a successful effort to unseat a Democratic high court justice by linking him unfavorably to former House Speaker Michael Madigan.

‘The stress has been unbelievable’: Naperville and Woodridge see uneven recovery one year after devastating tornado

One year after a tornado tore a three block-wide strip of devastation through Chicago’s western suburbs, a hard-hit neighborhood in Woodridge remains a work in progress.

The trees that smashed through roofs and littered the streets are long gone, replaced by saplings swaddled in green irrigation bags. Plenty of sawed-off trunks remain, though, bearing witness to what happened in a few violent moments the night of June 20, 2021.

Likewise, while many houses are adorned with gleaming new siding and freshly shingled roofs, a few are still boarded up and one is simply gone, leaving nothing behind but a foundation, a security fence and a construction company’s advertising sign.

• Katie Wilson was crushed by tree limb and lost her unborn son during the Woodridge tornado. She’s still working to overcome her injuries. ‘It just takes time.’

• One year after a tornado decimated their house, a Naperville couple is still working with contractors and insurance: ‘I just wish it was time for us to move in’

‘We are not monsters’: Women in Illinois prisons who allege they were victims of domestic violence see their struggle in film as they face limits of law designed to aid them

Inside a rec room at the downstate Logan Correctional Center, a projector screen leaned slightly forward but was upright enough as an audience gathered in front of it to watch a film.

“And So I Stayed” — which documents efforts to pass a law in New York that allows survivors of gender-based violence to present the abuse they suffered as consideration for new, shorter sentences — was being shown for the first time to an audience inside a correctional facility, and specifically to people who had been convicted of serious crimes they argue were related to abuse.

As the group, mostly women, watched the film’s stories of three survivors, including the abuse and torture they suffered, the anguished 911 calls they made to report their crimes and the strained phone conversations with their children from prison, those at Logan nodded in agreement and shook their heads in frustration. They reached for support, holding hands or touching each other’s shoulders in shared grief.

John ‘Moon’ Mullin, former Chicago Tribune reporter who for decades covered the Bears, dies at 74

During his final weeks, as a stream of family members, friends and former sports media colleagues came to his bedside at Lake Forest Hospital, John “Moon” Mullin remained full of resilience, positivity and gratitude. One after another, each visitor left inspired by Mullin’s strength and impressed with his grace.

From the day he was diagnosed with Stage IV pancreatic cancer in 2019, Mullin set his mind on fighting his battle with a positive attitude, beginning a push to squeeze the most from whatever time he had left. He was still intensely engaged in that quest until the end.

Louisa Chu review: Sugar Moon, an experimental baking studio, makes one of the best caramelized crust pizzas in Chicago

Dina Cimarusti, owner and baker of Sugar Moon, opened the small storefront in Logan Square nine months ago. Now she thinks she should call it an experimental baking studio.

What Tribune critic Louisa Chu discovered were some of the best bites she has had this year were made at Sugar Moon.