Trail Mix: Pritzker vs. Proft

👋 Hi, it's Justin. I'm back from LA reenergized for this week's Trail Mix!

Driving the news: Now that Paddock Publications has stopped printing Dan Proft's newspaper advertisements, Gov. JB Pritzker is back in for the Daily Herald forum.

• After Pritzker learned Proft was using a postage permit from the Daily Herald's parent company to send out his various faux newspapers, the governor withdrew from a Herald debate last week.
• The tactic worked. Paddock terminated Proft's contract, citing journalistic integrity.

What they're saying: "Little Lord Fauntleroy threw a tantrum and got his way," Proft said in a statement, promising to continue publishing the ads presented as newspapers "even if we have to return to the Gutenberg Press."

• Proft tweeted yesterday that he's found a new distributor to continue printing the newspapers.

There's more: Proft's latest TV commercial, featuring a nurse and former gubernatorial candidate claiming she was fired by Pritzker, was pulled by both WGN and NBC.

• The governor's campaign called the ads untrue and defamatory.

Zoom out: Political attack ads are dominating nationally.

Between the lines: Dan Proft's PAC has become a daily storyline in this campaign — a campaign he's not running in.

Election judge shortage

Cook County Clerk Karen Yarbrough isn't trying to appeal to veterans in order to win votes or raise money.

• Instead, she's trying to get them to work on Election Day.

Driving the news: Yarbrough says Cook County faces a critical shortage of election judges, which could cause problems on Election Day.

• Last week, she said the county needs at least 7,000 people to cover suburban polling places but has only 4,350.

The big picture: This is a national issue. According to Vet the Vote, more than 130,000 poll workers have dropped out over the last three midterm elections.

What do you want?

At the Online News Association last week, I attended a panel about how journalists should cover midterms.

• The panel highlighted the Citizens Agenda, a project designed to learn what voters want from election coverage.
• Luckily for us, Axios Chicago has the most engaged readers (and humans) around.

So we'll just ask: What do you want from this newsletter when it comes to covering the upcoming November election?

📬 Email [email protected], and we'll post your ideas this week.