John Kass to shut down website

A great journalist. Sad to see him sidelined by illness.

John Kass to shut down website

By Monica Eng, Justin Kaufmann and Carrie Shepherd, Axios News

Oct 16, 2026

Longtime political columnist John Kass says he's ending his independent news site after suffering five strokes in three years.

Why it matters: Kass has been a prominent and sometimes polarizing voice in Chicago journalism for decades, first at the Chicago Tribune and more recently through his own conservative website and "The Chicago Way" podcast.

The latest: In a message to contributors obtained by Axios, Kass said he plans to publish a "winding down" column before closing JohnKassNews.com on Thanksgiving.

"It's not that I want to, but I have to," Kass wrote, describing his struggles with brain fog.

Flashback: Kass spent 38 years at the Tribune, becoming a columnist after the legendary Mike Royko died in 1997.

He left in 2021, accepting a buyout amid a wave of departures following the paper's acquisition by hedge fund Alden Global Capital.

His departure followed a 2020 controversy in which the Tribune's newsroom union accused him of invoking antisemitic tropes in a column about billionaire George Soros. Kass denied the accusation.