19 killed, over 100 shot over holiday weekend in Chicago

Over the Fourth of July weekend, over 100 people were shot across Chicago, 19 of whom lost their lives. This year's Independence Day violence included nearly twice as many shootings and deaths as 2023, where 62 people were injured and 11 were killed. 

While the majority of victims were men, a number of women and children were also injured and killed over the violent holiday weekend, which the Chicago Sun-Times classified as between 11pm on Wednesday July 3 to 5am on Monday July 8.  

During a press conference on Monday, Chicago Police Department Superintendent Larry Snelling slammed those who resort to violence to settle their "petty" arguments on celebratory days, noting that in many cases, alcohol is involved. He also explained what he encountered while visiting people at the site of one of the shootings. 

"I saw a neighborhood that was heartbroken, angry, fed up," he said, "but I also saw a neighborhood that wanted to come together and come up with a plan to fight this type of violence, this senseless violence that took the lives of two mothers and an 8-year-old child." 

Mayor Brandon Johnson told reporters he was "heartbroken" by the news that over 100 people were shot and a fifth of them died the July 4th weekend. "These are not just numbers on pages," he declared. "These are not just headlines in the news. These are our fellow Chicagoans, our neighbors, family members who've lost their lives." 

Johnson went on to suggest that the shootings "did not happen in a vacuum," but were due to "generations of disinvestment and deep disenfranchisement in the communities where so much of the violence is taking place." After becoming mayor, Johnson also canceled a Chicago gunshot detection system in the city made to help police fight crime.