Daniella

Am I losing my mind or has there been an uptick in how many Not In Service CTA busses I see driving around

Jackie Brown feat. Jourdain Searles Podcast Episode · Hit Factory · 07/22/2025 · 1h 54m

I’m on Hit Factory this week talking about one of my favorite films of all time: JACKIE BROWN
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/j...

Thread... a snapshot of how things stand right now, a report from the battlefield.

Lowering the curtain - Chicago Reader Trump’s brutal cuts to arts funding demonstrate the vulnerability of a culture sector tied to state ideology. How will Chicago rebuild?

Whatever scale destruction takes place under Tr*mp will not magically go away under a new president. To quote THE INSIDER, "What got broken here doesn't go back together again."

But to echo a quote in my piece: "Our involvement with each other is mandatory."

chicagoreader.com/music/music-...

I hope outlets like the Reader can continue to provide those opportunities. I want the arts, this outlet, journalists, *all of this* to be funded. I hope you provide individual support if you can. But at a systemic level, these problems are much bigger than individual donations.

... to be careful with sources, research, and fact-checking, I simultaneously witnessed carelessness and capitulation from larger, institutional news outlets that have resources I can't even fathom. I learned a lot writing this piece and still have a lot of ways to grow as a writer.

I love the Reader, and I think this story is important. The attacks on the arts and the attack on journalism are hand in hand, and the systems supporting them have been broken for a long time. As I put in these hours and paid extra careful attention...

Lastly (and I am speaking as myself, from one experience, not as anyone's representative): I voluntarily donated my work on this piece because the alt-weekly that I knew would platform this investigation and handle it with genuine care has had financial challenges of its own.

If you follow me on here, I assume you are sympathetic to the arts, and most likely not a fan of this current administration. I implore you to see how these attacks on the arts fit into this administration (and the entire system)'s predilection for capital over people.

I worked at an arts nonprofit for 3.5 years, and for the last four years I worked with dozens of nonprofits of all sizes, shapes, and resources/capacities. This is the most vocal and straightforward frustration I have ever heard from a sector expected to demonstrate "resilience."

...frustrations with the city's cultural affairs department, a quote from the final passage of "Middlemarch," and a deep, deep belief in valuing other people, their invisible labor, and the magic that happens when we come together in community.

This piece has everything: Official NEH emails sent from bizarre, non-government addresses, a grant cancellation received three minutes after the performance it was funding opened (funds already spent), interrogation of the nonprofit industrial complex...

ICYMI: Over one month, I interviewed more than 30 orgs and individuals impacted by the Tr*mp administration's aggressive attacks on the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Institute of Museum and Library Services. 🧵

chicagoreader.com/music/music-...

Thank you for sharing!

"Its aim to disappear marginalized people from public life, its tactics rely on the invisibility of much of the cultural labor it is destroying. The jobs lost to these cuts won’t just include people you might see onstage: artists, preservation workers, costume designers, curators, researchers."

Lowering the curtain - Chicago Reader Trump’s brutal cuts to arts funding demonstrate the vulnerability of a culture sector tied to state ideology. How will Chicago rebuild?

Please make some time to read this week's @chicagoreader.com cover story by @daniellamazzio.bsky.social (with great editing from @pmontoro.bsky.social). Daniella's article really gets to the heart of some big questions that we need to be talking about right now.
chicagoreader.com/music/music-...

Lowering the curtain - Chicago Reader Trump’s brutal cuts to arts funding demonstrate the vulnerability of a culture sector tied to state ideology. How will Chicago rebuild?

Do me and @daniellamazzio.bsky.social a solid and read this week's @chicagoreader.com cover story. As far as I know, it's the first published attempt to take a big-picture look at the local impact of Trump's clawbacks of federal arts funding. chicagoreader.com/music/music-...

Could not have done this piece without @pmontoro.bsky.social's supportive and careful editing. Give it a read!

One important lesson: It's risky to tie the fate of anything you care about to government money if there's a nonzero chance your country will put fascists in charge.

Chicago Reader Volume 54, Number 41 Chicago Reader print issue of July 17, 2025 (Volume 54, Number 41)

New Issue Drop!

On the cover: Lowering the Curtain

Trump’s brutal cuts to federal arts funding demonstrate the vulnerability of a culture sector tied to state ideology by Daniella Mazzio

Pick up your copy in person tomorrow or read the PDF now!
bit.ly/3IukSyl

The cover story in this week's @chicagoreader.com is @daniellamazzio.bsky.social's can't miss, deeply-researched look at the impact cuts to the NEA, NEH, and IMLS (& more) will have on Chicago-area artists, arts & cultural organizations, and all of us. Check out the full issue PDF online!

Check-ups, Follow-ups, and 'Sorry, Baby' There’s that old adage about how our cells completely replace themselves every seven years.

A new newsletter from yours truly, including thoughts on the very excellent SORRY, BABY.

Give it a read:
room-tone.ghost.io/check-ups-fo...

Extremely true, but my point is Dems absolutely didn’t RUN on caring about trans people. It’s idiotic to imply that they did.

I aspire to be the foremost THE INSIDER scholar

Two Tenant Unions, One Rent Strike How renters in two Chicago neighborhoods found each other—and fought back—when the same investor planned to displace them.

Lots of great details in this new piece from @rebeccaburns.bsky.social including how much profit-seeking landlords are gambling that they can buy buildings, quickly remove the tenants, & flip or refinance it. + how all that makes them vulnerable to rent strikes. inthesetimes.com/article/chic...

I am doing my own due diligence and outreach, but would love to get connected to folks comfortable and eager discussing the true scope and urgency of these cuts.

#JournoRequest
Chicago: If you or your organization have been impacted directly -- or indirectly -- by the canceled NEA, NEH, or IMLS grants, I'd like to speak to you! DMs are open.

How the U.S. Enlisted Farmers to ‘Feed the World’ in the 20th Century It was also a time when the federal government took a more active role in rural communities. Simons explores how the Lend-Lease Act of 1941—which enabled the U.S. to supply Great Britain, the Soviet U...

I spoke with historian Peter Simons about his new book, Global Heartland: Cultivating the American Century on the Midwestern Farm, for @barnraiser.bsky.social.

We talked about the Lend-Lease Act, row crops, "feeding the world" & a whole lot more. Check it out!
barnraisingmedia.com/global-heart...

Pope Leo XIV could be the next appointed head of the CTA. Anything is possible these days

"Chicago Pope" is like a 1994 SNL sketch. Airs at 12:20am, the only gag is that Chris Farley has a mustache and is doing a big accent. David Spade and the guest host (Joe Mantegna) keep breaking during it.