Evening Briefing: Omicron disrupts Chicago schools

January 5, 2022

By Remy Tumin

Good evening. Here's the latest at the end of Wednesday.

A closed elementary school in Chicago on Wednesday.Lyndon French for The New York Times

1. Omicron disruption is hitting Chicago hard.

After two days back in classrooms, the city's teachers' union voted to stop reporting to work over concerns that the school system was bungling its response to the wildly contagious coronavirus variant. The city responded by calling off school altogether.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot insisted that the city's classrooms were safe, accused the teachers of engaging in an illegal work stoppage and declined to allow classes to shift to remote instruction, which the union had suggested. The fight left parents scrambling to find child care.

Separately, Americans can begin filing for insurance reimbursement for rapid at-home tests next week, the White House said. And a panel of C.D.C. advisers endorsed boosters of the Pfizer vaccine for children aged 12 and over.

Continue reading the main story

President Emmanuel Macron of France delivering his New Year's speech to the nation on Friday.Christian Hartmann/Reuters

2. President Emmanuel Macron drew fierce criticism after he bluntly said that the government should make life miserable for the unvaccinated.

"I really want to piss them off," Macron said, referring to the unvaccinated in an interview with a panel of readers of Le Parisien, a newspaper. "And so we are going to continue doing that, until the end."

Continue reading the main story

Macron appeared to be trying to capitalize on frustration in France with the unvaccinated as skyrocketing infection rates have put him under pressure ahead of a presidential election in three months, our correspondent wrote.

In other virus news:

Australia denied entry to Novak Djokovic for the Australian Open after a standoff over the star tennis player's vaccine exemption.
Just months after Delta fueled hospital failures and funeral pyres, India's leaders once again are sending a mixed message: Their political rallies are packed even as they order curfews and work closures.

Trump supporters outside of the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2020.Kenny Holston for The New York Times

3. President Biden will speak at the Capitol tomorrow for the anniversary of the Jan. 6 attack on the building.

More than 700 people have been arrested since the assault by a pro-Trump mob. Attorney General Merrick Garland vowed that the Justice Department would pursue its inquiry into the riot "at any level," saying he would defend democratic institutions from attack and threats of violence. Look back on our coverage of the riot here.

A year after the attack, the Republican Party is still very much Donald Trump's party, our Politics reporters write, transforming his lies about a stolen 2020 election into an article of faith, and even a litmus test that he is seeking to impose on the 2022 primaries with the candidates he backs.

Last year, 10 House Republicans voted to charge the former president with inciting the riot. All of them are still struggling with consequences.

People gathered at the scene of the fire in Philadelphia's Fairmount neighborhood.Monica Herndon/The Philadelphia Inquirer, via Associated Press

4. A fire that burned through a rowhouse in Philadelphia killed at least 13 people, including seven children.

The fire in the city's Fairmont neighborhood was one of the deadliest residential fires in the nation's recent history. The building was run by the federally funded Philadelphia Housing Authority. "This is without a doubt one of the most tragic days in our city's history, the loss of so many people in such a tragic way," Mayor Jim Kenney said.

The cause of the fire is still under investigation. At least four of the building's smoke detectors failed to go off, a fire official said. There were 26 people in the duplex at the time of the fire, including eight people on the first floor.

A memorial in Riverdale, Ga., where Elyjah Munson, 11, was shot and killed while walking home from school.Alyssa Noel Pointer for The New York Times

5. Toddlers are discovering guns under couch cushions. Teenagers are obtaining untraceable ghost guns made from kits. Middle school students are carrying handguns for protection.

The number of children 14 and younger killed by gunfire has risen by roughly 50 percent during the coronavirus pandemic, according to the C.D.C.

Researchers attribute the increase in part to a surge of pandemic gun buying. The spike has raised alarms with law enforcement officials and families, but police departments and cities across the country are struggling to intervene.

Subscribe Today

We hope you've enjoyed this newsletter, which is made possible through subscriber support. Subscribe to The New York Times with this special offer.

Kazakh police officers detaining a man during a protest over surging gas prices.Pavel Mikheyev/Reuters

6. Thousands of people across Kazakhstan are taking to the streets over a surge in the cost of fuel.

The demonstrations, which began on Sunday, are the biggest wave of protests to sweep the oil-rich country for decades. Protesters stormed government buildings in Almaty, Kazakhstan's biggest city, and set the offices of the governing Nur Otan party on fire.

As protests continued, the president promised to "act with maximum toughness." Local news media reported that the police opened fire on demonstrators in the oil city of Atyrau, killing at least one person. The authorities shut off the internet and blocked social media and chat apps.

Kazakhstan is at the heart of what President Vladimir Putin of Russia sees as the Kremlin's sphere of influence. Pro-Kremlin media portrayed the events as a plot against Russia. Here's what's behind Kazakhstan's biggest crisis in decades.

Haze from wildfire smoke in San Francisco in September 2020.Philip Pacheco/Getty Images

7. Two kinds of dangerous air pollution are overlapping more often as wildfires and extreme heat batter the Western U.S., researchers said.

From 2000 to 2020, millions of people were exposed to more days of smoke combined with ozone each year, and researchers suggest the increase is linked to climate change. High levels of either pollutant can be damaging, "but when they both occur at once, then you're getting the worst of both worlds," one climate scientist said.

Separately, we visited a nature reserve in Oregon that is essentially a large wildfire laboratory. Researchers say forest management methods like controlled burns can be a big factor in reducing wildfire intensity.

From top left: Neve Campbell, David Arquette and Courteney Cox reunited for "Scream."Elizabeth Weinberg for The New York Times

8. They screamed, we screamed and now they're in "Scream" again.

After more than a decade, Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox and David Arquette return to take a new stab at the meta-horror franchise. But they didn't jump in right away: They couldn't imagine it without the original director, Wes Craven, who died in 2015. Eventually, they all agreed, and now they're back (along with another Ghosface) for the reboot-meets-sequel.

We also spoke to Willem Dafoe, Alfred Molina and Jamie Foxx — three actors who are very good at being bad — about reprising their villainous roles in "Spider-Man: No Way Home."

A deluxe nigiri box from Sushi Kaneyoshi.Rozette Rago for The New York Times

9. Los Angeles is the glorious sushi capital of the U.S., our California restaurant critic writes.

Few locales outside Japan can equal the variety, skill and creativity served at the city's countless sushi counters. Sushi chefs there "continuously redirect our attention away from the intensity of one pleasure, to another, and another, until the meal is suddenly and sadly over — a supercut of deliciousness, a blur," Tejal Rao writes.

And for a taste of vanishing New York, Dorie Greenspan makes this poppy-seed cake, a call back to her childhood and shops that are mostly gone.

Matthew Steuer and Constance Collins after a proposal at a wildlife reserve in South Africa.

10. And finally, will you marry me?

No force of nature, not even a pandemic, could stop many couples from saying "I do." Marriage stories from around the world filled the Wedding pages of The Times last year, but before those marriages came the proposals. Our Weddings reporter rounded up his favorites.

In South Africa, one man had a lion cub deliver his fiancée her ring. In a Chicago proposal, the ring was the final component of an obstacle course. Another happened on a flight high above the Atlantic. John Shults Jr. proposed regularly for over a year to Joy Morrow-Nulton, both 95, until she finally said yes. "I wasn't going to give up until she said yes because she was worth it," Shults said.

Have a romantic evening.

Sean Culligan compiled photos for this briefing.

Your Evening Briefing is posted at 6 p.m. Eastern.

Want to catch up on past briefings? You can browse them here.

What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at briefing@nytimes.com.

Here are today's Mini Crossword and Spelling Bee. If you're in the mood to play more, find all our games here.

Continue reading the main story