The Department of Homeland Security said it was moving forward with ramped-up immigration enforcement in Chicago this week in an effort dubbed Operation Midway Blitz, as Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson says the city “received no notice of any enhanced immigration action” ahead of the announcement.
“This ICE operation will target the criminal illegal aliens who flocked to Chicago and Illinois because they knew Governor Pritzker and his sanctuary policies would protect them and allow them to roam free on American Streets,” the department said in a statement Monday.
Spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said the operation “will target the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens in Chicago.”
The department did not specify how long the operation is expected to last, but a spokesperson with ICE said, in a statement: “ICE has always operated in Chicago, targeting enforcement around the dangerous criminal aliens that are drawn to this sanctuary city. … We will continue our law enforcement and public safety mission, undeterred, as we surge ICE resources in the city in coordination with our federal partners from across Department of Homeland Security and Department of Justice.”
The department said the mission would be carried out “in honor of Katie Abraham,” who was killed in a drunk driving hit-and-run crash that happened in Urbana, about 130 miles south of Chicago, earlier this year. Her friend, 20-year-old Chloe Polzin, also died in the crash. The driver was 29-year-old Julio Cucul Bol, a citizen of Guatemala who authorities caught in Texas days after the crash, and believed to have been trying to flee to Mexico. He is now in custody in Illinois.
The victim’s father, Joe Abraham, spoke with CBS News Chicago, saying he hopes no other family has to go through what his family has.
“Hopefully, no other children will have to go through this Russian roulette that the state is playing,” he said. “(Cucul Bol) didn’t have a drivers license, he shouldn’t have been on the roads, he had been pulled over before. … Say what you want about Donald Trump. He at least acknowledged me, looked me in the eye, said, ‘We’re going to clean things up.'”
In a post on X, Gov. JB Pritzker accused the Trump administration of failing to communicate or coordinate their immigration enforcement effort with state and local leaders.
“Once again, this isn’t about fighting crime. That requires support and coordination — yet we’ve experienced nothing like that over the past several weeks. Instead of taking steps to work with us on public safety, the Trump administration’s focused on scaring Illinoisians,” he wrote.
Johnson said he and other city officials “remain opposed to any potential militarized immigration enforcement without due process because of ICE’s track record of detaining and deporting American citizens and violating the human rights of hundreds of detainees.”
“There are more than 500 documented incidents of human rights abuses at detention facilities since Trump took office, including deaths of detainees and alleged cases of sexual abuse of minors by federal immigration agents,” Johnson added. “Because of these incidents and more, we remain opposed to militarized immigration enforcement that runs afoul of the Constitution in our city.”
The mayor urged anyone concerned about the immigration crackdown in Chicago to visit a “know your rights” resource hub on the city’s website, at Chicago.gov/KYR.
The announcement of the immigration operation in Chicago comes after President Trump, in a post on Truth Social on Saturday, invoked imagery from the movie “Apocalypse Now” and wrote, “‘I love the smell of deportations in the morning …’ Chicago about to find out why it’s called the Department of WAR.”
Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, accused the Trump administration of ramping up its campaign “to arrest hardworking immigrants with no criminal convictions.”
“These actions don’t make us safer. They are a waste of money, stoke fear, and represent another failed attempt at a distraction,” Durbin said in a statement.
A new CBS News poll shows that 58% of Americans oppose the president sending the National Guard to other cities beyond Washington, D.C., while 42% support it. Those responses are heavily skewed by party, with a majority of Republicans in favor of the deployment of the National Guard and the majority of Democrats opposed.
