After being the Phillies’ most consistent hitter for the first three months, Brandon Marsh has hit his first real slump of the season in July. In a small sample size of 12 games in the month, Marsh has a .163 batting average and .483 OPS, compared to his .297 average and .819 OPS over the whole season.
He entered Saturday hitless in his last 12 plate appearances.
“Obviously, everybody’s not going to just keep rolling the whole year. You’re always going to have spots,” he said. “I mean, the last trip in general, we had a few guys that struggled on the road and hit a stretch like that as a team, and it obviously didn’t look as good, but in general, Marsh is fine.”
Mattingly added that he believes Marsh might be adjusting to the higher workload that comes with the everyday role. Now that Marsh has worked his way into starting against lefties — with a .242 average — he is not getting as many days off. Mattingly said he tries to give Marsh a day off his feet whenever he can.
Brandon Marsh played in his first All-Star Game on Tuesday.Yong Kim / Staff Photographer
In the first half of 2025, a platooning Marsh started 56 games, though he also missed two weeks in that stretch with a hamstring strain. This year, he started 87 games before the All-Star break.
“For the most part, I think he’s doing fine,” Mattingly said.
Marsh said earlier this season that going through the slump he had in April 2025 — when his batting average dropped as low as .095 to start the year before he turned things around — gives him the confidence that he can navigate another skid.
“I’ve never been hitting .090 in my life since I picked up a bat,” Marsh said earlier this year. “So seeing that was very humbling, and just seeing where I ended last year, I have that confidence and belief in myself if I go through it again, or go through a bad little stretch, that I can come out of it. And thankfully, last year was at the beginning, not the end, but definitely I learned a lot about myself in that time and leaned a lot on the guys around me.”
But Mattingly is not viewing things as anywhere near that dire.
“I don’t necessarily look at just the numbers,” he said. “I look at it, kind of see the quality of it. I can tell when guys are having good at-bats or bad at-bats or looking like they’re a little bit tired. But you’re basically looking at if they’re controlling the zone.
“In my mind, it’s like you swing at bad stuff, bad results are coming, right? It’s like you keep eating bad food, you’re going to end up in trouble. So it’s kind of that with me. It’s getting good pitches to hit, guys having good game plans, so that’s not really a number. But you can see when guys are having quality at-bats or not.”
The Phillies’ game against the Mets started one hour earlier due to anticipated inclement weather.Elizabeth Robertson / Staff Photographer
Phillies start time pushed forward
Due to anticipated inclement weather in the area, Saturday’s Phillies game against the Mets was moved up an hour to a 3:05 p.m. first pitch.
This marked the second consecutive Phillies game to be moved earlier following the All-Star break. Thursday’s series opener against the Mets was moved up an hour due to poor air quality, and the Phillies ultimately dropped the game, 4-1, to New York.
Extra bases
Alan Rangel (0-2, 4.19 ERA) is scheduled to start Sunday’s series finale against Mets right-hander Nolan McLean (6-6, 3.52).
For years, Shaoping Wu was part of an increasingly endangered group of human rights lawyers in China.
His work culminated in 2019, when he attended a meeting with other prominent lawyers and activists. Within days, the Chinese government began to detain the participants. Wu quickly fled to the United States, where in 2020 he applied for asylum.
On Wednesday, Wu was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Pennsylvania, where he had been living with his family and working as a contract delivery driver for Amazon.
Supporters and relatives now fear that Wu could be deported to China, where he would likely face persecution from the Chinese Communist Party. Under Chinese President Xi Jinping, the government has gone to great lengths to snuff out political expression, including by arresting human rights lawyers and activists. Two of the participants in the 2019 meeting are still serving lengthy prison sentences.
Wu’s wife, Caoliu Li, said that her husband had been subject to questioning and harassment by China’s security apparatus over the years but had remained dedicated to the cause of championing rights for ordinary Chinese.
“All along, he has been very focused on the things that are unfair in China and how to change them,” Li said in an interview Thursday from Lancaster, Pa., where the couple lives with their 17-year-old daughter.
John Visher, Wu’s lawyer, said that Wu had been delivering packages near Mount Holly Springs, Pa., when a police officer pulled him over as part of a traffic stop.
Visher said that Wu had entered the United States on a tourist visa in 2019 and that he had told the police officer about his pending asylum application and employment authorization document. Because Wu lacks legal status, police notified immigration officials, who detained him and brought him to the Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Pennsylvania, where he is now being held.
Wu is scheduled to appear in immigration court on July 27, Visher said.
The Department of Homeland Security said in an unsigned statement that Wu had overstayed his expired visa by six years and that he would receive due process. It noted that the department was offering $2,600 and a free flight to self-deport.
Wu’s case shows how even opponents of the United States’ biggest geopolitical rival are not guaranteed favorable treatment if their legal status is in question. And it is the latest test of how far the Trump administration is willing to go in its campaign to carry out mass deportations and curb the presence of asylum seekers.
This year, another Chinese dissident, Heng Guan, won his asylum case after he was detained by U.S. immigration officials who had tried to send him to Uganda. The department did not appeal the decision, and Guan was released.
Other cases involving Chinese nationals remain unresolved. Several Uyghurs, members of a predominantly Muslim ethnic group that has been systematically oppressed by the Chinese government, remain in ICE detention. They face deportation to third countries, according to Rushan Abbas, executive director of Campaign for Uyghurs, a Washington-based nonprofit.
The immigration actions have happened even as Trump has personally pushed for the release of two prisoners held by the Chinese government.
In May, during a summit with Xi in Beijing, Trump raised the case of Jin Mingri, a pastor who was detained in October as part of a major crackdown on Christians in China. This month, Jin was released and allowed to leave for the United States. The other prisoner, Jimmy Lai, a Hong Kong pro-democracy media tycoon, remains in Chinese custody.
In 2015, Wu was working as a commercial attorney in Shanghai when China, under the tightening grip of Xi, initiated its largest crackdown on human rights lawyers in decades. Many lawyers and activists who were arrested faced lengthy sentences. Some who remained went underground or stepped away from the work.
It was against that background that Wu joined the movement of rights defenders.
He began to take on more politically sensitive cases. His clients included Zhang Kun, an anti-corruption activist; Zhu Chengzhi, a human rights defender; and practitioners of Falun Gong, a spiritual movement banned in China.
“He defended some defendants that most lawyers would avoid,” said Fengsuo Zhou, executive director of Human Rights in China, a group based in New York.
At the 2019 meeting, which Wu attended with prominent human rights defenders like Xu Zhiyong and Ding Jiaxi, participants discussed China’s besieged human rights movement and democratic change.
Even after he came to the United States, Wu continued his work for human rights and civil society in China. This month, Zhou noted, Wu had spoken at an online gathering commemorating the government’s sweeping 2015 crackdown on lawyers.
“To the outside world, human rights lawyers might seem like a group of idealistic and tragic heroes,” Wu told the audience. “However, for us, this is not a romantic or performative act, but rather our unavoidable mission and responsibility.”
The attendance record was previously held by German comedian Mario Barth, who performed for 67,733 people in 2008, according to Guinness’ database.
The show was billed as the largest headliner of Gillis’ career and featured special guests, like fellow comedian Dave Chappelle and hip-hop group Three 6 Mafia, as well as Philadelphia icons rapper Meek Mill and Eagles Jordan Mailata and Jason Kelce.
This was somewhat of a homecoming for Gillis, who graduated from West Chester University and cut his teeth in Philly’s comedy scene. He was announced as a Saturday Night Live cast member in 2019 but was fired days later, before the season premiere, for having made homophobic and racist jokes on his podcast.
Having attended segregated schools in Birmingham. Ala., from 1959 to 1970, I know what a poorly funded public education system looks like. But I didn’t know my schools were being shortchanged until a federal court desegregation order closed all-Black Ullman High School in 1970, and I was reassigned to Ramsay High, which for most of its 60-year existence had been all-white.
Only a trickle of Black students began attending Ramsay in 1963, when Richard Walker became the first African American student there. But after Ullman closed, Ramsay abruptly went from being nearly 5% to about 50% Black. Both Black and white students experienced some serious culture shock as a result, but I don’t recall any major racial incidents during my one year on that campus.
What I do recall is that Ramsay’s books weren’t worn-out, hand-me-downs, that its science classes had enough working lab equipment for every student, and that its smaller student-teacher ratio made it easier for academically struggling children to get the attention they needed. In fact, to this day, I applaud all of my Ramsay teachers, including several reassigned there from Ullman.
My reminiscing about poorly funded schools was sparked by the Trump administration’s efforts to shut down the federal Department of Education, which has played a crucial role over the years not only in lessening the impact of past racism in America’s schools but otherwise ensuring adequate educational opportunities exist for all children, including those with financial or health disadvantages.
More Americans should be raising hell about what’s happening to the Education Department. But it’s hard to keep track of what to be upset about with this president. Every day, Americans are flooded by often inane news out of Washington that diverts their attention. So what if President Donald Trump has botched the repairs of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool? He messes up almost everything he touches.
The amount of news coverage given to that story was not only undeserved but a disservice. It also plays into the hands of Trump, who most likely would prefer to have people talking about algae in the Reflecting Pool instead of how much his ill-conceived war with Iran has cost in dollars and lives. The Iran war reminds me of a satirical movie released in 1997, Wag the Dog, in which a fictional U.S. president, after being caught trying to seduce an underage girl inside the Oval Office, fabricated a war in Albania to distract the American public from the sex scandal.
There’s nothing fake about our war with Iran. More than 3,600 Iranians and 4,000 people in Lebanon are believed to have been killed as a result of military attacks by our country and Israel. Thirteen U.S. service members and at least 39 Israelis have also died since the fighting began on Feb. 28. That’s why it’s so disheartening but necessary to question the war’s true intent.
Harold Jackson writes that Education Secretary Linda McMahon is just as ill-equipped for the job as her predecessor, Betsy DeVos.Julia Demaree Nikhinson
“If we didn’t do what we’re doing right now, you would have had a nuclear war, and they would have taken out many countries,” Trump said while meeting with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz on March 3. Our president would have us believe he started the war because Iran, which wasn’t close to having nuclear attack capability, was a greater threat to America than Russia or China, which already have advanced nuclear weapons. Or North Korea, which is way closer than Iran to achieving that status.
I pray Trump isn’t employing a horrific Wag the Dog ploy to divert attention from a war that has cost thousands of real lives and billions of dollars. But whether it was his intent or not, the American public’s understandable focus on the Iran war and its ancillary impact on consumer costs such as the price of gasoline and food has allowed Trump to push forward some dubious goals that more Americans might otherwise have vehemently rejected.
That includes Trump’s ongoing dismantlement of the Department of Education, which he tried but failed to do during his first term. Trump appointed billionaire Betsy DeVos, who had no background in education, to be his education secretary in 2016 so she could cripple the department. His current education secretary, billionaire Linda McMahon, is just as ill-equipped for the job as DeVos, but she, too, seems hell-bent on finishing what her predecessor started.
McMahon earlier announced plans to transfer two of her department’s largest units, the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education and the Office of Postsecondary Education, to the U.S. Department of Labor, move the Office of Indian Education to the U.S. Department of the Interior, transfer responsibility for childcare access and a foreign medical program to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and shift a foreign language education program to the U.S. Department of State.
Trump has never fully explained his zest to kill the Education Department, but it fits the states-rights attitude of some of his supporters, especially down South, who have long resented federal intrusion into how they run their public schools. Such resistance to federal involvement was about segregation when I was a child; today it’s more about encouraging vouchers and other programs that drain tax dollars and students from traditional public schools.
It’s not wrong to reassess the role the federal government plays in running local schools, but educating Americans’ children should remain a national priority — one that requires significant input from Washington to ensure some uniformity in educational opportunities and outcomes no matter where a family lives.
Congress passed the 1965 Elementary and Secondary Education Act with that in mind. Known as Title I, the law provides additional federal funding to schools with large numbers of students living in poverty. Changing Title I to a block grant program — without federal oversight — risks that the money won’t be spent where it is most needed. Misuse of taxpayer money led the Department of Health and Human Services to freeze access to more than $10 billion in block grants for California, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, and New York earlier this year.
The National Education Association warns that handing out block grants without clear restrictions would allow states to divert tax money to voucher programs — and essentially turn the clock back 60 years on education policy and progress. “While one would like to think that we can trust every state to do the right thing on behalf of all students, history tells us differently,” the NEA said. “States would not have to answer to anyone about whether or how they are following the law.”
As a product of the public schools in New Bern, N.C., population 34,000, McMahon should know better than to participate in any effort to divert taxpayer money from neighborhood schools. Public schools whose funding is based on enrollment lose money they can’t afford to lose when students using vouchers leave them. With less funding, public schools don’t get better. And children in families who, even with vouchers, can’t manage the logistics of getting a child to a supposedly better school outside of their neighborhood will be hurt.
Harold Jackson, who served as editorial page editor for The Inquirer from 2007 to 2017, was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing in 1991 and retired from the Houston Chronicle in 2020. His memoir, “Under the Sun: A Black Journalist’s Journey,” was published by the University of Alabama Press.
A federal appeals court ruled Friday that New Jersey’s bans on assault firearms and magazines that can hold more than 10 rounds are unconstitutional.
This is the first time a federal appeals court has struck down a state ban on such weapons, and it comes as the U.S. Supreme Court is set to consider whether bans on semiautomatic rifles violate the Second Amendment. Just last week, a different federal appeals court upheld Illinois’ ban on semiautomatic weapons.
Friday’s appeals court ruling in the New Jersey case goes further than a July 2024 ruling from a federal judge, who said that the state’s ban on AR-15s specifically was unconstitutional but upheld the provision barring larger magazines. The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Friday in its opinion that the state’s ban on all semiautomatic rifles it deems to be “assault firearms” and restriction on “large capacity ammunition magazines” were unconstitutional.
New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport, a Democrat whose office defended the law, said in a statement that the decision is “as unfortunate as it is legally incorrect.”
“Every other federal circuit court to consider the issue has come out the other way,” Davenport said. “Assault weapons and large capacity magazines play a dangerous role in the modern epidemic of mass shootings, and New Jersey acted reasonably and lawfully in restricting them. We are considering our options.”
John Commerford, executive director of the National Rifle Association Institute for Legislative Action, called the ruling a “historic victory for the NRA, the Second Amendment, and law-abiding Americans.”
In addition to New Jersey, 10 states, as well as the District of Columbia, have laws that generally ban the manufacture, sale, and transfer of assault weapons, according to the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. The District of Columbia, New Jersey, and 11 other states cap magazine capacity at 10 rounds generally or for certain types of firearms.
Adam Winkler, a law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, said that Friday’s ruling was surprising because federal courts of appeals have upheld assault weapons bans in the past. On the other hand, he added, the decision “may be foretelling the Supreme Court’s coming opinion on assault weapons bans.”
“What this Third Circuit opinion shows is that there are very few gun laws that are safe from being struck down right now,” Winkler said.
The buyers: Eric Murchison, 35, vice president and commercial loan officer
The house: A 2,617-square-foot townhouse in East Falls with 4 bedrooms and 3 baths built in 2025.
The price: Listed for $525,000; purchased for $490,000.
The agent: Marvin Capps, Marvin Capps Realty, Inc.
The kitchen of Murchison’s new East Falls townhouse.Jessica Kourkounis / For The Inquirer
The ask: The idea of buying in Philly had begun to feel impossible to Eric Murchison.
Born and raised in North Philly, he’d watched prices in the city skyrocket for years, convincing him that in order to own a nice home, he’d need to move somewhere like Texas. He’d already begun telling friends that he’d be gone within two or three years.
But when a work client urged him to think about buying in his home city — Why would you leave your hometown? Why not own a piece of it? — he began to think seriously about the possibility.
“I kind of couldn’t sleep at night after he said that to me,” Murchison said.
What he was looking for wasn’t extravagant. He wanted a garage and a rooftop space, along with a separate bathroom for his 16-year-old daughter — which he didn’t have in his rental in Bala Cynwyd. And to be “in an area where you could visually see that developers are in this space.”
He hoped to find all that under $500,000, even as his real estate agent tried to temper expectations.
“When I said ‘under a half-million,’” Murchison recalled, “he said, ‘Eric, are you kidding me? That’s [probably] not going to happen.’”
Eric Murchison, 35, on the front steps of his new East Falls townhouse.Jessica Kourkounis / For The Inquirer
The search: By his own admission, Murchison’s search was “very spontaneous and random.” He’d see a potential home while searching online during his lunch break and decide to go check it out.
One — a duplex near Temple University — was well over his budget, at $750,000. (He’d liked the idea of buying a duplex and renting out one of the units while living in the other.)
Another home he liked in South Philly was priced around $550,000, with no wiggle room. “The guy just was not budging on the price,” Murchison said.
Discouraged, he let his property manager know that he was renewing his lease for the following year.
The primary suite includes a walk-in closet.Jessica Kourkounis / For The Inquirer
The appeal: The first time he came across his future home was on Zillow. It was also on his drive to work, so he’d passed it on his commute, admiring the newly constructed townhouses.
But when he randomly met the developers through work, he said, it felt like kismet.
The development was across from a cemetery and a bit over budget at $525,000. But it was just a 10-minute drive to Center City and a half-mile walk to Kelly Drive, where Murchison liked to go running. He liked the neighborhood, too, which he felt was poised for a boom.
Murchison turned one of the home’s four bedrooms into an office and meditation space.Jessica Kourkounis / For The Inquirer
Because it was a newly constructed home, it was part of a city program that provides a 10-year tax abatement to buyers who bought into certain new construction projects in the city.
“But what ultimately made me move on it was that feeling like, ‘This feels like it could be home,’” he said. “I remember having that feeling, and seeing my daughter, envisioning us like having popcorn and watching TV, and I kind of had in mind where I could put the furniture.”
By the time he toured a second time, he was sold.
The first floor of Murchison’s new townhouse. At 2,617 square feet, it’s more than twice the size of his previous rental. Jessica Kourkounis / For The Inquirer
The deal: Listed at $525,000, Murchison initially offered $480,000 before settling on $490,000, with a 6% seller’s assist.
Though it was a new home, an inspection turned up some minor issues — a loose faucet and a noisy kitchen range fan — that the developer agreed to fix.
The money: Murchisonwas prepared to put 3% down on the new home.But when he inquired with another lender, he said, he was able to get a more attractive deal, in which a down payment wasn’t required.
“I actually got a refund at settlement because I had the 6% seller’s assist,” he said. “So the only down payment was like transfer tax, closing cost, all those things.”
Today, his mortgage is $3,400 — $400 more than his previous rent — and because of the tax abatement, he pays just $68 a month in taxes, he said, instead of the roughly $500 he’d otherwise owe.
The primary bathroom in Murchison’s new townhouse.Jessica Kourkounis / For The Inquirer
The move: With the money he was able to save by not putting down the 3% down payment, he was able to pay for movers, plus a nice dinner for his first night in his new home.
He moved in the same day he closed on the home. “Iclosed Feb. 6, I think at like 10 a.m., [and] the movers were done by 1 p.m.,” he said.
Life after close: At more than 2,500-square-feet, the new home dwarfs Murchison’s previous rental, which was about 1,000 square feet.
In addition to bedrooms for both him and his daughter, he also has a meditation/prayer room.
Eric Murchison’s daughter’s bedroom in his new East Falls townhouse.Jessica Kourkounis / For The Inquirer
So far, he’s had one small renovation project done — removing some shelving in a hallway between his bedroom and bathroom — with plans to make two more improvements in the not-too-distant future: adding a sauna, as well as some shade to the rooftop.
He considers himself “very happy” with his new home, and hopes his story inspires other Philadelphians that homeownership in the city remains possible.
“People need to know — especially Philadelphia natives who think they have to leave — like, hey, if you have a good real estate agent and you have creative financing, you might as well buy.”
A rooftop deck is one of amenities Murchison was seeking in his new home. He got it.Jessica Kourkounis / For The Inquirer
Did you recently buy a home in the Philadelphia area or South Jersey? Share the story of how you did it. Email Inquirer real estate reporters at properties@inquirer.com.
The special prosecutor for crimes on or near SEPTA property will be funded through the end of the year as part of the newly approved state budget, Pennsylvania lawmakers said this week.
After that, the office’s fate is uncertain.
The controversial position is set to expire in December. It was championed by GOP lawmakers in Harrisburg, who for years have tried to limit Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner’s powers and contended that the position was necessary because Krasner failed to prosecute crimes on the state’s largest transit system.
Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman (R., Indiana), thetop Republican leader in Pennsylvania’s split legislature, where Democrats narrowly control the state House and Republicans lead the state Senate, said Democratic leaders repeatedly rejected GOP efforts to extend the position as part of the closed-door budget talks.
Krasner’s office has strongly opposed the law that created the special prosecutor position, calling it a “shocking usurpation of power” that unconstitutionally singled out Philadelphia and stripped an elected officials’ authority.
He could not be reached for comment Thursday.
The post has also faced opposition from Philadelphia-area lawmakers who say the effort is an affront to city voters who have reelected Krasner, a progressive prosecutor, three times.
“This is nothing more than voter suppression and an attempt to circumvent some of the extremely popular criminal justice reforms under this DA,” said Sen. Nikil Saval (D., Philadelphia), who chairs the city’s Senate delegation to Harrisburg.
Pittman, by contrast, said extending the special prosecutor is a critical component for Senate Republicans to agree to a new long-term funding source for SEPTA, which is approaching another fiscal cliff that could cause service disruptions when the state’s current short-term fix runs outnext year.
Asked about the future of the special prosecutor’s office, House Majority Leader Matt Bradford (D., Montgomery) said at Shapiro’s budget signing earlier this week that he hadn’t “given it much thought.”
Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday, a Republican who is tasked with overseeing the office, has lauded the special prosecutor’s work so far.
He said his office supports extending the position, calling it a “force multiplier” that has been effective in combating violent crimes against both SEPTA employees and riders.
“Our caseload reflects a range of very serious conduct — including murder and aggravated assaults — and we have secured results through convictions,” he said.
In one example of that effort, the special prosecutor will oversee the case of a 22-year-old woman charged with simple assault after authorities said she pepper-sprayed and punched a conservative social media influencer during a viral confrontation on a SEPTA bus.
Some House Democrats supported creating the role in 2023, as part of a state budget deal with the Senate GOP and Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro, who was critical of Krasner when he served as attorney general.
Saval said Democrats shouldn’t use the position as a bargaining chip again.
“House Democrats who voted to suppress the will of Philadelphians should be ashamed of themselves, and should not support other attempts to do so,” Saval added. “This has nothing to do with the essential task at hand, which is to secure funding for mass transit.”
A spokesperson for Bradford said the House needs to “take a critical look” at whether the SEPTA special prosecutor is necessary. She noted SEPTA’s success in reducing crime and the size of its police force, but said the money used to fund the position may be better spent to reduce fare evasion by replacing gates to full-length ones that cost $40,000 each.
The funding was approved in the 2026-27 fiscal year budget “in the case of reauthorization,” and would be used to wind down the office, said Beth Rementer, Bradford’s spokesperson. Any unused funds would be returned to the general fund, she said.
A spokesperson for Shapiro declined to comment on the prosecutor role, but said Senate Republicans “need to do their jobs” to find a long-term funding solution for mass transit.
The office
The office is overseen by Special Prosecutor Michael Untermeyer, a former deputy attorney general and real estate investor who ran against Krasner in the 2017 primary.
Untermeyer did not respond to a request for comment.
The single lawyer employed by his office is investigating about 15 cases, including charges of homicide, aggravated assault, and robbery, according to a spokesperson for the attorney general’s office. That figure does not include cases the special prosecutor is considering taking on or are still under investigation, the spokesperson said.
Lawmakers could still choose to extend the position as part of their fall legislative session. It is among the several time-sensitive issues before the General Assembly ahead of the November election, in which Democrats hope to flip control of the state Senate for the first time in decades.
Krasner’s office has challenged the special prosecutor role from the beginning. His office filed a lawsuit in 2024 in an attempt to nullify the law, but was rebuffed by a 4-3 Commonwealth Court ruling that said legislators had not violated the state constitution in creating the post.
The office then appealed to the state Supreme Court, which has yet to decide the matter. As the high court heard oral arguments in the case last year, justices cited the Pennsylvania Constitution when suggesting that the legislature had been free to pass such a law, even if it interfered with the duties of an elected county official.
And lawyers for the attorney general’s office argued that the special prosecutor role did not strip Krasner’s power, but rather offered additional powers to a prosecutor appointed by the attorney general to handle cases involving crimes in and around SEPTA property.
An informational presentation on data centers before the Philadelphia Planning Commission sparked controversy Thursday, as more than a dozen community groups opposed bringing the energy-intensive facilities to the city.
A Philadelphia man has pleaded guilty to stealing nude images of five victims from their cell phones and posting them online without their permission.
President Donald Trump cast aspersions on election integrity in a televised address Thursday. Gov. Josh Shapiro said the speech was “not connected with reality.”
Screens that played reenactments depicting the daily lives of people enslaved at the President’s House in Philadelphia were turned off, among other changes to the site.
A couple quietly collected rotten-smelling extraterrestrial material for scientists after a meteorite crashed into their New Jersey home two years ago. A study says it contains “alien world chemistry.”
South Philly’s newest cafe has a home-run breakfast sandwich and lines out the door.
A reader asked: My new-to-the-area coworker keeps calling Wawa “waWa” where she emphasizes the second syllable more than the first. The first time it happened, I just made sure to say it correctly so she’d get the hint. It didn’t work. The second time, I let it go. The third time, I told her the deal but was maybe too subtle because I didn’t want to seem rude. Now, she’s still saying it that way. And to be clear: She has no distinguishable accent. Do I say something more explicitly or has the time passed? I’m trying to help!
To handle this case, we tapped in Inquirer columnist and Wawa superfan Stephanie Farr, along with life and culture reporter Dugan Arnett.
Arnett, who seems to enjoys the mispronunciation, came to a simple conclusion: They’re probably doing it on purpose to poke a bit of fun.
But the Philadelphia dictionary is sacred, after all. Farr, who recounted an embarrassing moment after committing a Philly faux pas, is wary of letting it slide.
“As someone who was a transplant many moons ago I say to you, a recent Philly transplant, that is not going to go well,” Farr said.
In this week’s Shackamaxon, Inquirer columnist Daniel Pearson unpacks Philadelphia’s success as a host city for major events, the emergence of self-driving cars, and chatter about a progressive takeover for incumbent Council seats in next year’s races.
“As someone who closely follows City Council, I have mixed feelings about this news,” Pearson writes.
Tis the season for outdoor movie screenings! We’ll show you a photo of a free film showing taken in the Philly-area, you drop a pin where you think it was taken. Closer to the location results in a better score. Good luck!Kerry Hyland
Think you know where these moviegoers are set up? Our weekly game puts your knowledge of Philly’s streets and places to the test. Check your answer.
🧩 Unscramble the anagram
Hint: 🎶 Reunited (with the Union) and it feels so good 🎶
Cheers to Ed Rivkin who correctly guessed Friday’s answer: I Play Rocky. The trailer for the forthcoming biopic shows iconic Philly scenes and gives glimpses of the many hardships that went into making the first movie.
Plus: Rocky always represented the best of Philly. The city is finally loving him back, writes columnist Mike Sielski.
We were there
President Donald Trump attended a Defense and Innovation Summit hosted by U.S. Sen. Dave McCormick at the U.S. Army War College in Carlisle on Wednesday, marking his second stop in three weeks to Pennsylvania. National politics reporter Sam Janesch has the story, with photos by staff photographer Tom Gralish.
Somewhere on the internet in Philly
😳 Don’t mind us. We’re just casually replaying the video of LeBron James saying the magic words “trust the process” over and over again. He says it’s not a Sixers hint … but we’re still closely monitoring the Bron-O-Meter.
On Sunday, the eyes of the world turn to New York for the World Cup final, capping a tournament set to beat the record for highest cumulative attendance in World Cup history.
The deeper story of this tournament isn’t playing out under the lights. It’s unfolding in the parking lots, transit hubs, and neighborhoods around the stadiums, where immigrant families are asking whether hosting the world’s game means being welcomed — or being watched.
Fans of Senegal and France gather outside New York New Jersey Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J., on June 16. The deeper story of this tournament is unfolding in the parking lots, transit hubs, and neighborhoods where immigrants wonder if they are being watched by ICE, writes Debbie Almontaser.Hiroko Masuike
A recent poll conducted by Opinium for the transatlantic think tank Concordia Forum found that 45% of Muslims in the U.S. are often or always worried they or someone close to them will be affected by anti-Muslim violence. More striking still, over 39% said they avoid certain places out of safety concerns. Their fears will have been sharpened by two fatal shootings within a week by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents — one in Maine, one in Houston. In both cases, neither man was the original target of the enforcement operation, and both leave behind grieving families.
This is what “enforcement” looks like under this administration: lethal, indiscriminate, and expanding.
Now Washington is bringing that same posture to New York. In advance of the final match, border czar Tom Homan has promised New Yorkers “more ICE agents than you’ve ever seen,” framing it as payback for New York’s sanctuary laws — local rules limiting how far city agencies help federal immigration enforcement. The surge is timed to a tournament that’s drawn millions of visitors, many from countries now targeted by expanded travel restrictions.
It is hard to read this as anything other than an attempt to punish New York for refusing to do Washington’s enforcement work for it.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani delivers an address from George Washington’s desk, surrounded by recently naturalized citizens, to commemorate America’s 250th anniversary on Friday, July 3.Anna Connors
New York has not backed down. Mayor ZohranMamdani has been unambiguous, calling ICE’s presence an attempt “to divide us” and noting that six U.S. men’s national team players are themselves immigrants. His administration has restricted New York Police Department cooperation with ICE, barred federal agents from city property without a judicial warrant, and has completed and published a citywide audit of every city agency’s dealings with federal immigration authorities — a level of transparency and follow-through most sanctuary cities never attempt.
That kind of institutional courage carries a cost, and I know exactly what it can look like up close. As an immigrant rights advocate in the weeks after 9/11, I saw this play out in my Brooklyn backyard on Coney Island Avenue, where thousands of Muslims were rounded up and detained and/or deported under the Bush administration. Washington is running the same playbook now, just at a much larger scale: manufacture a threat, attach it to an immigrant identity, and let the political pressure do the rest.
Brazil fans sing while watching the FIFA World Cup Group C match between Brazil and Morocco during a public watch party in New York’s Central Park on June 13.Andres Kudacki
That escalation doesn’t stop with the final whistle. Los Angeles hosts the Olympics in 2028, and Washington’s willingness to weaponize federal enforcement against a host city sets a precedent every future host will have to reckon with. Agents visibly stationed near Sunday’s Central Park watch party would send an unmistakable message about how far this administration is willing to go to undermine New York’s resolve in full view of the world.
New York’s sanctuary protections are real, and Mamdani has been consistent in defending them. Washington’s decision to turn a global celebration into a show of federal force against a city that has broken no law — a city that has only declined to do the federal government’s job for it — is the actual failure here. Call it what it is: retaliation, staged for an audience of billions. All eyes are on New York again — this time, waiting to see what Washington does next.
Debbie Almontaser is a Yemeni American educator with 25 years’ experience teaching in New York City public schools. She is a published author and motivational speaker, spending two decades advocating for Muslim and immigrant communities in New York. She is also the founding principal of NYC’s Khalil Gibran International Academy and CEO of Bridging Cultures Group.
Kurt Vile’s love of Philly — and Philadelphia’s affection for Kurt Vile — has never been in question.
For the cover of Constant Hitmaker, the 2008 album that announced his arrival, Vile posed in front of a blown out wall “that looks like a Rauschenberg painting” at the corner of Frankford and Norris, he recalls. “That stuff’s beautiful, you know?”
Since 2012, a Steve “ESPO” Powers mural that doubles as the cover for Vile’s 2013 album Wakin On A Pretty Daze has adorned a wall at Front and Master Streets in Northern Liberties, visible to travelers headed north on the Market-Frankford El.
With his signature mane and quizzical expression, Vile, who grew up in Lansdowne in Delaware County, has been the face of Philly’s reign as the capital city of 21st century indie rock.
Kurt Vile stands in front of a mural by Steve “ESPO” Powers on March 27, 2013. Michael S. Wirtz / Staff Photographer
The city is embedded in Vile’s music at every turn, from the “I park for free!” boast on the 2018 song “Loading Zones” to the cover of 2022’s Watch My Moves, which pictures the Dad rock king wearing a crocodile mask in Wissahickon Valley Park, flanked by daughters Awilda and Delphine.
But Vile has never repped his hometown so hard as on his new album, Philadelphia’s Been Good To Me, released in May. It includes shout-outs to Lincoln Drive, the Schuylkill, and Sun Ra, and an infectious single “Chance to Bleed” that features Philadelphia gangsta rap pioneer Schoolly D in a video shot at Kung Fu Necktie.
Philadelphia’s Been Good To Me even includes a playful taunt at two of Vile’s classic rock favorites who dared to record songs with the word Philadelphia in the title.
“A couple of my heroes wrote a song,” Vile talk-sings in “You Don’t Know Cuz It’s My Life.” “But that ain’t where they’re from, so hey you don’t know / But I still love you, Neil and the Boss.”
Working in the wee hours in his basement OKV studio — which stands for “Overnight Kurt Vile” — in his fieldstone house in Mount Airy, Vile recalls, “I was singing along to this keyboard track I had laid down, and that thought came to me.”
Kurt Vile in his basement studio at his home in Mount Airy June 13, 2022, with his daughter Delphine.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
Vile, who had (legally) parked his Prius in a nearby loading zone, was talking at the Silk City Diner on the Sunday night of Memorial Day weekend where he would realize a long-held ambition: sitting in with centenarian saxophonist Marshall Allen and members of the Sun Ra Arkestra.
Vile — who was wearing a Tammy Wynette T-shirt and MF Doom trucker’s hat, with his 1965 Fender Jazzmaster Sunburst in the booth beside him (without a case) — explainedhis unique position in Philadelphia music history while dining on an Impossible Burger and Korean fried cauliflower.
“Springsteen wrote the song ‘Streets of Philadelphia’ and Neil wrote ‘Philadelphia,’ and they’re both on the soundtrack to Philadelphia, right?” he says, referring to Jonathan Demme’s 1993 AIDS drama.
“I get where they’re coming from, but it’s still an assignment. They’re singing about a city they don’t know that well. I’m proud of the city that I’m from, and I’m also lucky that I’m from here.
“It’s like my friend Mary Lattimore, who plays the harp.” (And has given lessons to Vile’s daughters, who also both play guitar.) “She’s not from Philly, but she lived here forever, so it feels like home to her, even though she’s in LA now.”
The album cover of Kurt Vile’s ‘Philadelphia’s Been Good To Me,’ which features a photo by Memphis photographer William Eggleston.Verve
Adam Granduciel of the War on Drugs, with whom Vile frequently teamed up when both were aspiring artists in the 2000s, also grew up elsewhere and now lives in Los Angeles.
“They’re two of my oldest friends that were in the Philly scene forever, but they don’t have the extended history that I do.”
Kurt Vile with his father, Charlie, and his daughters Delphine (left) and Awilda, who posed with him on the cover of his latest album, at his home in Mount Airy on June 13, 2022.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
The Philly fixture
Vile — who is the oldest boy among the 10 children of his SEPTA train operator father Charlie and stay-at-home mother Donna — is Philly-area born and bred.
“I’m the OG,” he says. “That’s what I’m proud about. It’s like Questlove, or something,” though for all the Philly repping the Roots drummer does, he doesn’t live here either.
Vile, by contrast, is a Philadelphia fixture. When artists like country rebel Margo Price, Australian rocker Courtney Barnett, and North African desert blues band Tinariwen have come to town, there was one way to know for sure they were in Philadelphia: Kurt Vile was standing next to them onstage.
Vile plays the Dell Music Center with his band the Violators on July 25 as part of Connor Barwin’s Make The World Better Concert Weekend. He played Barwin’s first MTWB Foundation benefit in 2014, which raised money to build playgrounds and rec centers throughout the city.
“I don’t follow football and I didn’t know who he was,” Vile says, recalling meeting Barwin at a show. “He walked in and he looked amazing. He was so tall, like a [expletive] Eagle. He was just a genuine fan. I love reconnecting with Connor and watching him do his thing.”
Vile’s July 25 show is the second of two MTWB nights at the Dell. The first-night headliners are 1990s alt-rock heroes Pavement.
“Pavement was my gateway drug to indie rock,” Vile says. “Stephen Malkmus was my hero. I got my first job as a busboy at the Blue Comet on Baltimore Pike and I would spend all my money on Pavement CDs.”
Now, Vile is friends with Malkmus, and was stoked when he found out they were both playing the MTWB weekend — until he realized that he has a gig in Boston the night Pavement is playing. “I’m missing Pavement by a day,” he says. “Which I’m not happy about.”
Vile, 46, has spent his entire life living in the Philly area, save for 2002-03 when he followed his wife Suzanne Lang to Boston while she got a master’s degree at Emerson College.
Philly alt-rock star Kurt Vile outside the Silk City Diner on Sunday, May 24, 2026 in Philadelphia.Yong Kim / Staff Photographer
He worked as a forklift operator for an air freight company. “The most ball bustin’ blue-collar job there is,” he says. Before he mastered the machinery, “I got made fun of a lot my first year. But then I got really good at it.”
Returning to Philly and moving to Northern Liberties, he went to work for Philadelphia Brewing Company, where he was hired by future pizza sensei Joe Beddia who was roommates with Granduciel. “They were all blown away by my forklift skills,” recalls Vile. “And that’s how I met Adam.”
At PBC, Vile met Jack Rose, the late Philadelphia guitarist who, like Vile, was a fan of influential American Primitive guitarist John Fahey.
Asked to name his top five Philadelphia artists, Vile starts with Rose. He then adds Purling Hiss guitarist Mike Polizze, and psychedelic folk singer Meg Baird, Petty Bunco label head and singer Richie Charles, along with Schoolly D.
“Is that five?” It is, but Vile has a couple more: Marshall Allen-slash-Sun Ra, and rockin’ country band Florry. “They’re so fun and excitable and young,” Vile says.
Kurt Vile in the music room in his home in Mt. Airy June 13, 2022 (this is not the basement studio)TOM GRALISH / Staff Photographer
“I love Mount Airy and Germantown,” he says. “There’s still so much old-school Philly in Germantown. And Mount Airy really saved my life. I love that there’s forest, and I have room to think.
Kurt Vile at his home in Mount Airy June 13, 2022, with his daughters Awilda (left) and Delphine, who posed with him on the cover of his latest album.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
“But I can still go to the city any time, and it’s so quick,” driving his Prius down Lincoln and Kelly Drives. “You go in through the Art Museum, and it’s a classy way to go in, you know?”
Over 10 albums, Vile has continued to develop a raw, unhurried signature sound. He often seems to be talking to himself in a bemused drawl over patient jams that turn out to be transfixing.
What country star Keith Urban once said of Vile’s 2015 hit “Pretty Pimpin’” in naming it as one of five songs he wished he’d written applies to Vile’s songwriting in general: “I don’t know how he wrote it, but it sounds like pure stream of consciousness.”
Philly alt-rock star Kurt Vile walking outside the Silk City Diner on Sunday, May 24, 2026 in Philadelphia.Yong Kim / Staff Photographer
‘Philadelphia’s Been Good To Me’
On Philadelphia’s Been Good To Me — whose cover features a photo by Memphis photographer William Eggleston — that deft, uncanny approach is evident on tracks like “99th Song,” an ode to a loop pedal that turns out to be a paean to domestic bliss.
“Stoned on music, well, the best kind of high,” he sings. “Got love in my life, and three girls by my side.” Later, the album includes a more straightforward love song: “Every Time I Look At You,” which begins: “Every time I look at you, sparks fly from my eyes.”
At Allen’s birthday party, Vile took a seat next to guitarist DM Hotep at the rear of the stage. “I was playing spacey, bendy Sonic Youth-hybrid leads,” he said afterward. “I felt really calm up there.”
A few days after that party, Vile celebrated the release of Philadelphia’s Been Good To Me at the Triangle Tavern in South Philly, where 200-plus fans lined up to purchase the album and receive a free vegan cheesesteak as a bonus.
Vile headed out with the Violators in June, and checked inbefore a sold-out show at San Francisco’s Castro Theatre this month.
“I’m a little discombobulated today,” he says, ordering a late afternoon large coffee and glazed doughnut. “It was a late night.”
The night before, Vile enjoyed a day off at Festa, a beloved San Fran karaoke bar closing this year he wanted to visit one last time. “I’m shy at first, but then everybody sings and I get up, too.” His go-to is “Stand Back” by Stevie Nicks.
The tour, Vile says, “is going good, man.” This trek has made him rethink the streaming era. He’s a fan of physical media, and feels “the past was more simple and honest.”
Philly alt-rock star Kurt Vile at the Silk City Diner on Sunday, May 24, 2026 in Philadelphia. Yong Kim / Staff Photographer
“But now the way people can consume your catalog from streaming, the younger people can binge my catalog like Netflix, and I can tell that they know all of my music. I just feel that people are connected.
“This is my 10th record, and I’ve accumulated all these songs that have emotional qualities combined with a dreamy, pretty, hypnotic thing, and then it rocks live with my electric guitar. It just keeps evolving. The songs are simple enough, but the possibilities are endless.”
On the bus, Vile has been keeping Philly — and Delco — close to his heart.
Kurt Vile in concert at the Union Transfer, Friday, June 3, 2022Steven M. Falk / Staff Photographer
“I’m watching Mare of Easttown,” he says. “I never saw it, and now I’m obsessed, just watching all the Delaware County locations and hearing Kate Winslet say a sentence half-Delco, half-British.” He slips into a Winslet impression: “I’m hoping for an an-swer,” and chuckles to himself.
“But it’s my favorite show in a long time,” says Vile, who has Task cued up next. “And it’s got Mannequin Pussy in it. Does the director not know who I am?” he wonders. “I guess I’ve got to get in touch.”
“The timing is interesting, ‘cause I’ve been spending a lot of time in Delco lately,” says Vile, who’s been hanging with his parents and recently dropped in at his old haunt Paul Revere Pizza in Lansdowne. “Now I’m traveling, and I’m touring my Philly record, and I’m loving it. I’m loving being somewhere else and not in Philly every night. But I’m watching Mare of Easttown. And I know I’m gonna love it when I come home.”
Kurt Vile & the Violators with They Are Gutting A Body of Water and Twisted Teens at the Dell Music Center, 2400 Strawberry Mansion Dr. at 7:30 p.m. July 25th, dellmusiccenter.com.
