>> thanks for joining us on Chicago tonight.

I'm Brandis Friedman.

Here's what we're looking at.

Folks get real quiet asked them to provide some of the specifics.

>> Mayor Johnson bats down concerns over efficiencies as budget hearings wrap up.

>> How would you want your children to taking care this for you?

A look at how a group of volunteers is helping kids get to school amid high streets.

>> And Ken Burns joins us to talk about the ultimate epic, his new documentary about the American Revolution.

>> First off tonight, SNAP recipients will finally begin to receive full benefits within a week.

Now that the country's longest government shutdown is over.

The state says it's working as quickly as it can to issue payments.

>> We have to make major adjustments snap to try to meet the various levels of SNAP funding allowed by the courts.

Originally, it was 0 to 65%.

Back to 50%, though, some people working to get any at all.

Now we're back to 100% so we're working as fast.

We can to make sure that people have the snap cards charged and ready to go.

>> The Illinois Department of Human Services says the remaining benefits from recent partial payments will be made starting tomorrow.

All recipients should receive full benefit payments by November.

20th nearly 2 million Illinois residents, including 900,000 in Cook County, rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP to feed themselves and their families.

Reverend Jesse Jackson remains in the hospital this evening.

The 84 year-old civil rights icon is reportedly at Northwestern Memorial Hospital under observation for progressive Super Newport, super a nuclear palsy.

A rare neurological disorder.

In a statement, the Rainbow PUSH Coalition said, quote, He has been managing this neurodegenerative condition for more than a decade.

He was originally diagnosed with Parkinson's disease.

However, last April, his PSP condition was confirmed.

The family appreciates all prayers at this time.

Reverend Jackson has been wheelchair-bound and receiving round the clock care at home from relatives in recent months, including sons Jonathan and Jesse Junior.

A daycare worker is out of federal custody after being detained by federal immigration agents at the preschool where she worked.

The video of Diana Santana Galliano was arrested at the Ricoh.

Those souls, Spanish immersion daycare was widely shared online as she can be heard in the video telling agents that she has papers.

A federal judge agreed with her attorneys that her detention without a bond hearing is unlawful.

Federal prosecutors have been given to store been ordered to schedule a bond hearing by next Tuesday.

Attorneys for Sunday and a Galliano say they will continue to pursue her.

Immigrations claims to allow her to stay in the U.S.

There's more of this story on our website.

After budget hearings.

What is the state of the mayor's plan and or new taxes on the way?

That's right after this.

>> Chicago tonight is made possible in part why the Alexandria and John Nichols family.

The Pope Brothers Foundation.

And the support these don't.

>> Negotiations over Chicago's Twenty-twenty 6 budget are coming down to the wire with no easy fix is in sight.

Major parts of Mayor Brandon Johnsons, 16.6 billion dollar budget for 2026 remain in flux.

Even as officials scheduled crucial vote on the spending plan for Monday.

So are headed.

Sharon joins us now with more.

Heather, so even as these departmental budget hearings are set to wrap on Thursday, there's still no clear consensus on the bulk of the mayor's proposal to tax the city's wealthiest residents and biggest bombs to the tune of 617 million dollars.

Where does the debate stand?

>> Well, older people had hoped to a report from consulting firm, Ernst and Young would give them a road map out of this quagmire to detail ways to make cuts.

That would not impact city services.

But that report would only make changes that would result in significant savings for the city in future years.

Leaving the older people forced to decide whether to impose a $21 per month per employee tax on the city's largest firm or make deeply unpopular cuts.

As Budget Committee Chairman Al Durham, NH Jason Urban often says everyone wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to So some city council members they have called for at least some of those tax hikes to be replaced by cuts.

>> Here's the mayor responding to those calls on Monday morning.

Of course, this is after that.

First snowfall of the season.

>> We hear a lot of calls for cuts.

>> And people like to refer to them as efficiencies.

But that folks get real quite weak, asked them to provide some of the specifics.

Chicagoans do not want to see our snowplowing reduced.

They do not want to see less workers out there working in the night so that their mornings can be better.

>> Heather, why are officials finding it so hard to reduce city spending?

>> What no one has propose cutting even a single dollar from the proposed 2.1 billion dollar budget for the Chicago Police Department.

And that accounts for one-third of the entire discretionary fund, the city Council gets to decide how to spend.

>> Add in the other public safety departments you talking about half of that discretionary fund without with putting all of that money off limits.

Significant carts are cuts are hard to come by.

So the federal government shutdown over, but the agreement to reopen the federal government.

It blew an unexpected 10 million dollar hole in the mayor's budget plan.

What happened?

Well, Mayor Johnson wanted to tax the sale of intoxicating hemp products.

2 $1 per item and ban the sale to those under 21.

But the bill signed by President Donald Trump on Wednesday fans that entire industry making it unlikely the city is going to see that 10 million dollars any time And we know last year's budget negotiations stretched deep in December.

Is that going to happen again?

we'll know more on Monday when the administration is scheduled to crucial votes by to city council committees.

They have the votes food.

If they don't, they'll delay, which means that if they don't maybe the budget will be adopted by Thanksgiving almost a month earlier than last year.

All Sharon, you'll have your eyes on it for us.

Thanks so much.

Thanks.

Brand us.

And you can read full story on our website all at W T Tw Dot com Slash news.

>> Well, >> for the last 2 months, many Chicagoans have taken it upon themselves to protect their communities from the rise in federal immigration enforcement in the city.

There have been whistle workshops aimed at mobilizing in safeguarding neighborhoods.

And as our Joanna Hernandez reports, there are dedicated volunteers who initiated a program to walk kids to school.

>> So we're going to pick up Daniel first.

Then are next up is Rebecca Meat.

Alyssa made she's one of the Volunteers for an initiative called The Walking School Bus.

>> I'm gonna go ahead and message.

>> The chad just so that way.

Just because mom knows that we're on the way should get dressed up with the snow.

>> Runs one of the daily walking grounds for an elementary school in Albany Park, stepping in to help parents who are free to leave their home to take their kids to school.

The parents we spoke with asked us not to identify the school because of concerns of ongoing immigration enforcement.

You talked about there being different route.

How many kids do you think in all are being picked I think at least 80, if not closer to 100, but it depends day by day.

>> Despite Chicago's first winter storm of the season, we get to experience.

first snow of them dedicated to providing are making sure these children arrive at school safely.

The moment that the raids started happening and people started getting pulled off the street.

You could just see it.

You can see less students.

Plus families, less vendors.

And it really did change.

It just became a relief.

response, parents, educators and neighbors decided to step up.

>> It has been a lot to get this under way and like up and running.

But I've had so many staff members, so many community members step in and help like how can I help you with the apps?

How can I help you with scheduling?

How can I help you with the route?

>> Teacher don't say he Mina says the walking School bus gives kids some sense of normalcy with getting them to know volunteers.

I've started to see.

>> All of these students show up in a lot of their conversation at school is like just living in the community goes, don't know school.

I miss Maggie knows what littles little used to start and we start with and noticing kind of not even realizing the distraction that was created and what we're trying to close off for them.

It's a growing movement among Chicago residents.

>> Taking action to resist and protect their communities for Midway blitz, operations.

>> It is really very heartening to see just how much we will all show up to to be a part of making sure that all of our kids are safe, that all of our people are safe.

>> May says volunteering her time is the right thing to do you could kind sense to kick the here of some of the kids alike.

Will I come home to an empty house and we still have to.

We still to sit with that and know that that is a reality.

But at least they are getting one bright simple spot every for Chicago.

Tonight, I'm joined on this.

>> And for more about the Walking School bus or to learn how to volunteer, please visit our website for more information.

Up next, a filmmaker Ken Burns and his co-producer on the new Epic Project, the American Revolution.

Stay with us.

>> Reflecting the people perspectives that make can This story is part of Chicago tonight.

Not the >> The American Revolution.

A new film from Ken Burns, Sarah Botstein and David Schmidt tells the extraordinary story of the Birth of the United States.

But if you think you're familiar with that story, think again, more than 9 years in the making this 6 part 12, our documentary series tells the Tale of the country's founding struggle from viewpoints.

You haven't seen before.

It begins with a reminder that the United States we now know was not the first nation here.

>> Long before 13 British colonies made themselves into the United States.

The 6 nations of the Iroquois Confederacy Seneca.

Okay.

You got Onondaga Tusker Oneida and Mohawk had created a union of their that they called the hold in the show me a democracy flourished for centuries.

>> Joining us now with more about this monumental project.

Our filmmakers, Ken Burns and Sarah Botstein.

Welcome to Chicago tonight.

Glad to have you both here.

It's good to be back there grass on this massive project is quite the cover and longtime sure it has.

So as we just heard, you begin with a different confederation of states, not so much the colonies that we know becoming United States, but specifically Native American nations that long predated the American revolution.

How important was it to begin with that context, Well, I think, you know what we're taught in grammar school is that the American revolution is about taxes and representation.

And that's true.

But it's also about.

>> Native American land.

And I I thought it was interesting as we learn more and more about it, that Benjamin Franklin had himself been inspired by the Hood initiative.

Is this Iroquois Confederacy and their model that had worked for a long time as a model for the United States.

And he convenes 7 of the 13 colonies in Albany drew a picture of a snake cut into pieces under dire warning.

Join or die.

And then we just realize maybe that shouldn't be in the body of the film.

It may be at the very beginning so that we could realize that with the revolution is is a World War, a civil war and a war essentially over the prize of North America.

And what is the prize?

This land?

What and that land is already occupied by 13 British colonies super imposed over the land of British of Native nations and to the anymore.

Native nations that are extraordinarily complicated groups, each individual and is different from one.

Another is say France is from Belgian and we want to make sure that was understood that at the heart that this is about moving into this new space.

Pence Laney.

It for is that so much more fun than many of us really And and many people don't fully appreciate.

Once you get into the war part, right?

Just how savage that conflict is.

>> Here's a clip discussing the aftermath of the battle of Bunker Hill in June of 17, 75.

>> It's for the most awful hours of combat in American military history.

There are 1000 British casualties that day.

Are 220 some British debt.

40% of the attacking force was killed.

2 injured.

40%.

That's horrendous.

The high casualty rate.

It is the highest casualty rate for the British army for the state.

Some in 1916.

>> It is unbelievably >> about time we hear from one expert who says part of the Revolutionary War report of the Revolutionary History has been sanitized.

What are we mis understanding?

We're forgetting about the revolution.

>> Well, I think, you know, we forget that the American revolution at least 2 things happening at the same time.

One is huge revolution of ideas and how government might be structured and who might lead that government and who might be responsible in selecting coup rules that government and the other is a terribly broody brutal.

Very complicated as Ken was just saying, 18th Century war in 18 th-century war is really terrible and awful and and scary and violent and dark and in order to really understand our founding story.

I think you really have to brave the 2 together.

You have to understand the revolution for war of ideas and ideals and then the war that was fought for those ideals and principles to have a have a run.

>> Buchanan, other conversations.

You talked about democracy being sort of an unintended consequence of the revolution.

What mean by So the idea is, first of all, there's a quarrel between Englishman that gets broken out into natural rights.

It's the and so they're thinking of arguments about why Britain is wrong.

And all of a sudden they're no longer saying where you said this and you deserve But human beings themselves by being human beings deserve that natural Jefferson is going to say all men are created.

Equal value owns other human beings.

The cat is out of Now.

Human beings are going to have to be equal even though it takes 4 score 9 years have been in the United States.

That's over.

So things are beginning to change and more in the world.

And the American revolution is leading that change of how these ideas are moving.

So this assumption of democracy is that these people are going to come together and create a republic.

They mean of an elite almost like the example that kind of we inherit from from Greece and to a lesser extent, Rome.

But the people are going to fight and die and win this war or so-called ordinary people and they're going to have to they're going to deserve something.

So you can say that democracy is not an object of the American revolution.

It's a consequence of that.

And there's a big difference of that.

And we are all the beneficiaries of that big difference.

>> So obviously lots of voices, reenactments footage over 9 years of work.

We hear a number of very familiar celebrity voices how do you think the series is different from any other document reviewed?

And well, you know, first of all, goes back to what Sarah and you were talking about with with the violence.

You know, if you've got to photographs, if you get the newsreels, the violence is proven.

But if you've got a painting and 70's got Havana and maybe there's even a little trickle into field they seem different for us.

>> It is.

They are very much like us.

So I I think this is a story about how you tell all the real story of the revolution and you get under the surface of it and and forget the distance and time and a lot of it doing reenactments.

A lot of it is asking.

>> The finest actors in the world to read off camera.

And I think we have that better cast than any film that's ever been made or television series ever.

That helped bring alive.

Not just the familiar top down folks and you get to know Washington a little bit better with more dimension.

dozens scores of other people that you've never heard of.

Sometimes they're teenagers, sometimes a Native American.

Sometimes free or enslaved black people.

Here women who are half the population and are central to the success of the revolution and to keeping the resistance alive, whose stories are told, but also all the other players in this group, global struggle, the French, the Dutch, the Spanish English, all of their soldiers.

>> All of their kings, all of their ministers.

And so what you do is by having all of these different voices, you give a sense that this is what really took place.

And instead of putting your thumb on one side or the other, you're an umpire calling and strikes and everybody's got their play.

Everybody understands their role in it and you can make it the complex.

I think most interesting story we've ever tried to tell.

>> So we've got another clip.

This one about the belief of those who are fighting for their independence.

Here's that.

>> I think to believe in America.

Rooted in the American revolution.

>> Is to believe in possibility.

>> That to me is the extraordinary about the Patriots side of the fight.

I think everybody on every side including people who were denied even the ownership of themselves.

>> The sense of possibility we're fighting for.

>> So, Sarah, when watching the film, there are times that you would expect the British to prevail in a particular battle.

And that's kind of what you know, we all learned in 5th grade as well.

You know, very well trained and organized been, you know, you expect him to win the battle and then the war.

But of course, that's not always what happens in We know that history has written what actually has happened.

What does that say about, you know, the the Americans who call themselves patriots at the time they misunderstood.

I don't think the Patriots were misunderstood as much as I think we don't understand how.

>> Absolutely unlikely it was that we were going to win.

How surprising it was that we were going to win, that we were able to throw off the biggest, most mighty military power in the world with the greatest navy in the world.

And we actually wouldn't have done that without the French.

But I think the Patriots were very successful as they moved from 17, 75 to 17.

81 down the eastern seaboard and rallying support, inspiring people.

I think the words of our declaration more meaningful.

I think the war nobody knew how it was going to turn out while it was being fought.

So we look back on it with a lot of ideas.

And I think we overlay the revolution even more than our other wars and are other moments in history with as can often says, a kind of sentimentality and where it's a distance because of the paintings, because of it's 250 years ago.

And the people who we know come down Sunday's paintings with wigs and, you know, they were young revolutionaries making it up as they went.

They didn't know how it was going to turn out.

People on the ground did know how it's going to turn out.

And it is really unlikely that we were able to do what we did.

Tell they're a little bit about the importance of the Native American nations as well as black people.

African-americans be free or enslaved for both sides of >> this war.

So I think, you know, you can't tell a story of America without widening the lens to see who is actually living here and who was fighting the war and who if that, whatever way the war went was going to be impacted by it.

And so in any film we make, we want to widen the lens and have people think about who's on the ground in the house next door to you who lives down the street and the Native American populations were vast and different and there were hundreds of them and they were not a monolith.

Just like no population as a monolith.

And free black people.

We're all different and the enslaved back and people made all kinds of very reasonable and rational decisions that, again, we look back and judge and more lies about when, in fact, it was very reasonable to side with the British.

It was very reasonable to be a patriot and was very reasonable to say.

What does this have to do with me and get out of the way as we see even today speaking of today because we're living through a tumultuous time, of course, which there's this, you know, bitter political division in the country right now.

>> Can as you're working on this film, was there any you know, of that deep division that you felt still resonates today?

Well, I think first of all, the one we're covering the American Revolution is deep Division.

We began this when Barack Obama and 13 months ago on his presidency.

So we've been watching the rhymes of history.

The echoes of history changes.

We've done it.

>> But here's the central thing.

When person is in a struggle, having great difficulty, they go to a professional and the professional wants to ask an essential question.

Where are you from?

Tell me your story.

Tell me about your parents.

How did you get to where you are right now?

Because that's the way we're going to unravel what's going on right now.

The difficulty you're having.

So if you go back in a time of great division and internal turmoil for an entire country, you go back to your origin story and find out where you begin, you might be able to find the pieces in which it's your less thrown out by how much division is.

There's always been division, but you might find the path back to how you solve that.

So we're hoping that if anything, this story does is help put the U.S.

back in the U.S.

and and permit a chance to celebrate the glories of what we invented.

This is the most important event in world history since the birth of Christ.

He changed the way people Everybody was a subject up until then and all of a sudden there are people who are citizens and the great responsibility that entails.

That's about as inspiring a story as I know.

And maybe it helps us get back to a place where there's less of that hand wringing less of the sky is falling.

Less of the sense of oh, it's so bad right now.

It's been a really bad.

It was bad in the revolution, a civil war.

It was bad during our civil war.

It's been bad at lots of different places that we've covered in the work that we've >> done together.

And so think there's a fundamental optimism.

When you study the past, there's also a fundamental sort of psychological therapy that takes place.

If we learn our origin story, we can help us get through this and begin to move on to the next grade phase, which is repair.

>> All right.

Around the it has been a pleasure and an honor to speak with you both.

Ken Burns and Sarah Botstein, thank you so much for joining us.

Congrats on the documentary series.

Thank you.

Thanks for having us.

And the American Revolution premiers on Sunday November 16th.

It will air on consecutive nights through Friday.

>> And we're back right after this.

And that is our show for this Thursday night.

You can stream Chicago tonight on our W T Tw YouTube Channel every evening.

>> And catch up on any programs you may have missed and join us tomorrow night at 5.37, for the week in review.

Now for all of us here in Chicago Brandis Friedman, thank you for watching.

Stay healthy and safe and have a good night.

>> Closed captioning is made