That’s a Tribune photo of the family arrested by the Crown Fountain on Sunday. I do not think any comments are necessary.
From Sunday Millenium Park Raid
Tag: immigration
Our News From The Font
Copying from Sunday Tribune, because th world shoul now.
In show of force, dozens of armed federal immigration agents patrol downtown Chicago
Residents watch while Gregory Bovino, chief U.S. Border Patrol agent, second from left, and other federal officers finish their march along North Clark Street by the Newberry Library in Chicago’s Gold Coast on Sept. 28, 2025, as part of an immigration blitz show of force. (Brian Cassella/Chicago Tribune)
By Adriana Pérez | adperez@chicagotribune.com | Chicago Tribune and Cam’ron Hardy | chardy@chicagotribune.com
UPDATED: September 29, 2025 at 10:34 AM CDT
Dozens of federal immigration agents were seen patrolling downtown Chicago Sunday afternoon.
Social media livestreams showed agents in front of Tribune Tower on North Michigan Avenue and in front of Millennium Park, detaining individuals. They also showed several U.S. Customs and Border Protection boats on the Chicago River.
The video of the agents walking in clusters downtown was recorded by lawyer Berto Aguayo, advising undocumented individuals to stay away and to be aware of their rights.
After sightings near Millennium Park and the Riverwalk downtown, the dozens of federal immigration agents — most of them wearing camouflage uniforms with U.S. Border Patrol patches — made their way up to the Gold Coast — a primarily white, affluent neighborhood — in the early afternoon, flanking the sidewalks of Clark Street.
Roughly 20 bystanders and passersby started following the officers, chanting “ICE, go home!” The agents stopped at the intersection with Oak Street. Several got in vans that drove away. For another 15 minutes, the crowd of protesters around them grew bigger, yelling “shame.”
A shrill whistle cut through the noise repeatedly.
Some of the civilians present confronted Gregory Bovino, the chief U.S. Border Patrol agent, who joined on the patrol.
When asked by the Tribune how many agents had been patrolling downtown Sunday, Bovino said, “a lot.”
Bovino declined to answer any additional questions from the Tribune. When he and the last of the agents drove away, protesters celebrated with applause and cheers. “The people, united, will never be defeated!” they intoned.
Present on Sunday was Enrique Espinoza, an attorney and member of the Hispanic Lawyers Association of Illinois, who said the agents’ presence downtown was performative.
Espinoza is an immigrant himself, hailing from Veracruz, Mexico.“Let’s be clear: This was a show. They wanted to get attention, and they got it,” he gestured toward the last remaining protesters as the crowd dispersed.
The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, could not immediately be reached for comment.
‘A major escalation,’ immigration advocates say
The move comes in the midst of what President Donald Trump’s ICE is calling its “Operation Midway Blitz,” which has sown fear throughout immigrant communities in Chicago and its suburbs. Officials escalated a promised surge in immigration enforcement in the area over the last two weeks, with arrests reported and federal agents sighted near local schools, courthouses and workplaces. ICE claimed last week it had made 550 arrests during the first two weeks of the mission.
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson said he was closely monitoring the situation in a post on X. “While Chicagoans and visitors are enjoying another gorgeous Sunday, they are being intimidated and threatened by masked federal agents flaunting automatic weapons for no apparent reason. This is another brazen provocation from the Trump administration that does nothing to make our city safer,” Johnson said.
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker also posted on X Sunday afternoon, “This is not making anybody safer — it’s a show of intimidation, instilling fear in our communities and hurting our businesses,” he said. “We cannot normalize militarizing American cities and suburbs.”
By mid-afternoon Sunday, the intersection was cleared, traffic was flowing and things went back to normal — much like in the Loop, where after earlier sightings and reports of a couple of arrests, tourists strolled under the sun and took photos of the city, most of them none the wiser.
After the downtown display, immigrant rights advocates held a news conference alongside local and state officials, including U.S. Reps. Jesús “Chuy” García and Delia Ramírez, Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton and several aldermen. They did not have an exact number of arrests made.
Sunday’s downtown operation in broad daylight represented a “major escalation by the Trump administration,” said Veronica Castro, deputy director at the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights.
Hers was a sentiment echoed by other speakers.
“Today, we witnessed the further militarization of ICE tactics in Chicago, as they showed up downtown to indiscriminately continue to profile against people just because of what they look like, their appearance,” García said. “This … is part of a nationwide effort by Trump and his administration to instill fear in people.” But, he said, “We want Trump and his aides to be clear: We will not take this lying down. You claim that you’re out to get the worst of the worst,” García said. “But we see time and time again that the people that you are apprehending and kidnapping and interrogating and terrorizing are hardworking people that make Chicago and Illinois a better place for everyone.”
Illinois state Sen. Graciela Guzmán said the administration is seeking to intimidate immigrants “by air, by water, by force, by any means possible” — alluding to the federal immigration agents, including Bovino, out in boats on the Chicago River on Sunday and Thursday, when they were first spotted.
“I want to remind folks at home that (at) every single level of government, here you have folks that deeply care about you,” Guzmán said. “We are doing everything in our power because you are our constituents. We love you, we will protect you.”
Chicago journalist arrested during Broadview protest released
Early Sunday, a journalist for Unraveled Press, who was detained by federal agents, was released after being detained at a Broadview protest Saturday night.
A social media post late Saturday showed Steve Held being detained by federal agents.
After he was released early Sunday morning, Held described his experience of being detained on the social media app Blue Sky.
His first words were, “I’m out, I’m sore.”
Held saw four holding rooms while being detailed, he said, two small rooms being used to hold protesters and two larger rooms to hold ICE and Border Protection detainees. He also said he saw a man sitting in a room with gauze wrapped around his head, appearing to have a serious head wound.
The room he was held in “stank of sweat & pepper ball powder after just a few hours,” the post said. Another room, he said, “appeared dirty, filled with men dressed for labor, trying to get comfortable to sleep in chairs or on the cold floor in the cinder block room.”
When getting processed, he said he saw the faces of men that looked “heartbreaking.”
“We have never witnessed anything like what ICE has unleashed on our communities this week,” Unraveled Press posted on social media Sunday morning.
Safe Schools for All Act
The Sun Times article – see below. Proud for the State of Illinois 🙂
Yesterday, Gov. JB Pritzker signed the “Safe Schools for All Act” into law, which advocates say will help protect families. The law prohibits public schools from denying access to a free education based on immigration status. It also requires schools to have procedures for law enforcement requests to enter a building.
When immigration enforcement operations in Chicago ramped up in January, a woman named Maria saw the chilling effect it had on the Belmont Cragin community firsthand.
As a parent-mentor at Lloyd Elementary in the Northwest Side neighborhood, she said some students expressed fears that they or their family members would be detained and deported by federal agents, perhaps on their way to school. Families considered leaving, she said.
The thought crossed her mind, too. Maria, whose last name isn’t being published to protect her identity, is undocumented, though her three children, including a third grader at Lloyd, are American citizens.
“I had a lot of fear,” she said.
That’s why she joined immigrant rights groups and elected officials Tuesday to celebrate Gov. JB Pritzker signing the “Safe Schools for All Act” into law, which advocates say will help protect families. The law prohibits public schools from denying any student access to a free education based on their immigration status or that of their parents.
“Now many families across the state can feel safer in their children’s public school,” Maria said. “Thanks to this new law we have more peace of mind that ICE is not welcome in our schools.”
The law also prohibits schools from disclosing or threatening to disclose information related to the immigration status of the student or an “associated person.” And it requires schools to develop procedures for reviewing and authorizing requests from law enforcement trying to enter a school.
In January, the Trump administration rescinded a Biden-era policy that protected certain places, such as schools and churches, from immigration enforcement actions.
State Rep. Lilian Jimenez, D-Chicago, and State Sen. Karina Villa, D-West Chicago, were lead sponsors of the bill. It strengthens at the state level protections that already existed at the federal level but feel tenuous under the current administration, they said. In 1982, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Plyler v. Doe that states cannot deny students a free public education on account of their immigration status.
But that hasn’t stopped some states. Earlier this year, Tennessee tried to pass a bill allowing public schools to refuse enrollment to children without legal immigration status. The effort failed after pushback from advocates and community members.
“All of these students, all of these teachers, all of our parents across the state of Illinois know that they have a safe school today, yesterday, tomorrow and we will stand up to this administration every single time,” Villa said.
Jimenez said her family of immigrants and many others see education as a path to success, which is why it’s important to make school buildings “sanctuaries” for them.
“Children need to be in school — and parents shouldn’t be afraid of going to school — because that’s a place where we can help children succeed so our community can succeed,” Jimenez said, noting Monday was the first day back for Chicago Public Schools.
CPS policy does not allow Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents into school facilities unless they have a criminal judicial warrant signed by a federal judge. The district also does not share student records with ICE or any other federal representative without a court order or parental consent.
Time Magazine: The U.S. Elected Officials Who Have Been Arrested or Approached by Authorities While Protesting Trump’s Immigration Crackdown
The U.S. Elected Officials Who Have Been Arrested or Approached by Authorities While Protesting Trump’s Immigration Crackdown article does not mention Chicago Aldremen, so I can only imagine how many cases like that had happened around the country.
During his speech at the World Refugee Day rally in Chicago on Tuesday, Mayor Brandon Johnson said pretty much “We will do everything to defend our Constitution from President Trump.” Not exactly those words, but very close, which is both ironic and sad.
The Time Magazine article full text is below.
Continue reading “Time Magazine: The U.S. Elected Officials Who Have Been Arrested or Approached by Authorities While Protesting Trump’s Immigration Crackdown”On Immigration
Shortly after the elections, I published a blog post about one of Time Magazine’s articles on immigration. In that post, I mentioned my Venezuelan co-worker who “didn’t want them here.”
It took just two months of Trump’s presidency for her position to alter in a most drastic way. Now, each time we go for lunch, she tells me what a horrible person Trump is to deport people when “maybe ten out of two hundred are criminals, and the others are honest hard-working people.” Now she sees for herself the impact of all Trump’s policies on economics and on people’s well-being in general, and she is asking me whether Democrats will be able “to put everything back” or some irreversible damage is already done.
And while I would prefer these revelations to come before, not after the fact, I hope she is one of many.
One More Time Magazine Article: Immigration Playbook
One of many good articles I saw recently: Democrats Need a New Immigrant Playbook. The fact that most new immigrants tend to be more conservative is well-known, and I was wondering why it has been so widely ignored. My co-worker who came to the US a while ago from Venezuela told me right away: these are the worst of our people; I do not want to see them here.
The full text is under the cut.
Continue reading “One More Time Magazine Article: Immigration Playbook”Meanwhile In Chicago
I am still on my vacation (for two more days), but today, I am recalling my escorting shift on June 15. It was early morning, and only our shift lead and I were there. Our shift lead brought some food for those who didn’t have time to have breakfast at home, as she always does, and as always, the food was inside the lobby.
We just got outside when a young Latinex man approached us and started to ask about something. It took us a couple of minutes until we realized that he was asking whether we had any food. B. (our shift lead) asked: do you want a banana? He nodded, and she rushed inside. I saw her putting together a parcel with bananas and bagels, adding some cream -cheese to bagels and adding more bagels. When she finally emerged and handed the parcel to a young man, he burst into “thank you” and “god bless you.”
B. and I started to talk about Venezuelans who had been kicked out of the shelters just before that. She talked about their wounded dignity and how men can’t stand the situation when women find work, and they don’t. I keep wondering what happened with the promise to issue work permits for Venezuelans. We have enough open positions in the Department of Streets and Sanitation or on CTA. Why not let people work, make money, and make the city cleaner? That’s what I thought when Biden announced the path to citizenship. I mean, it’s all great, but that will be “sometime,” and what about now? Why are they not allowed to work?! I can’t understand that…
Request For Evidence Disaster
When my mom passed the citizenship test, and the officer told us that now we just need to collect the evidence that mom didn’t commit any crimes during these past five years, I thought that it would be easy and was internally celebrating.
It turned out that it was anything but easy. Although the paper from USCIS was more than a page long, it didn’t provide any specifics on where and how we should collect that evidence. The office told us that we should go to the “local police department,” and they will know what paper we need.
I called the Palatine police department Department of Records, and their supervisor told me that indeed, she knew what kind of paper I need, and I do not need an appointment, just come during business hours.
Assuming that it would be the same in Rogers Park, I asked Igor to take my mom there, and that turned into a total disaster. They told Igor that they are not doing background checks, and have a document to prove it, and that Igor and my mom should go to the headquarters. They didn’t want to listen or look at the paper Igor tried to show them.
After Igor called me, I called the Police station three times, trying to explain what we needed. Three people hung up on me. I decided to try to reach the headquarters. There was no information on their website, but I found a direct number to call central 311 and pleaded with the office on the other end not to hang up on me!
The office gave me the Department of Records phone number, which turned out to be the right place. Our local police station could not provide the document we needed, but for a different reason than they cited… and why in the world could they not give us the same phone number in the first place?!
Igor took mom to the headquarters because the phone number is nowhere on the internet, only to find out that they were open until 1 PM, and it was too late by that time.
The next day, mom and I went to Palatine, and it was again the same story (they didn’t know whether they could give this paper, and mom was not in their system (and that’s precisely what we needed). They suggested they “call me later,” and I said that we came from Chicago and I was not going anywhere.
Forty minutes later, we finally got the paper and went home.
Then, on Friday, Igor took my mom to the Police headquarters again, and this time, they issued the paper we needed.
I uploaded both documents for consideration, and I hope this will be enough evidence. (BTW, I tried to call the USCIS helpline when the police hung up on me, but they only have an automated service, no humans.
If this is indeed the end of it, I will be very happy, but I still plan to file a complaint!
Asylum-seekers and racial tensions in Chicago’s Black neighborhoods
Over the past few months, Chicago has been dealing with waves of migrants from Central and South American countries, many of them bused in by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott. The African-American backlash to the proposal to set up shelters in majority-Black Woodlawn and, more recently, majority-Black South Shore has been covered extensively on the news, but the migrants have been arriving in the Austin community area as well.
Continue reading “Asylum-seekers and racial tensions in Chicago’s Black neighborhoods”
Hettie's Reflections 