Chicago officials have blasted President Donald Trump’s plan to send in 100 National Guard troops, with Illinois Governor JB Pritzker saying, “This is no way to live.”
Tensions have been high between Chicagoans and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents as they ramped up immigration raids in the country’s third-largest city.
Four people involved in anti-ICE protests in Chicago over the weekend were charged with assaulting and resisting officers outside an immigration facility in Broadview, according to court documents obtained by ABC News.
Attorney General Pam Bondi referenced what she called the “rioters” in a Monday memo, shared by Politico, that announced she was directing federal agencies to “defend ICE facilities and personnel.”
“I am directing the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the United States Marshals Service, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation to immediately direct all necessary officers and agents to defend ICE facilities and personnel whenever and wherever they come under attack, including in Portland and Chicago,” she wrote.
Trump promised over the weekend to deploy National Guard troops to Portland, and on Monday, it was reported that 100 guardsmen will be deployed to Illinois.
At a press conference Monday, Pritzker said the Homeland Security Department had sent a memo to the Department of War requesting the troops, claiming “a need for the protection of ICE personnel and facilities.”
The Independent has reached out to the Homeland Security Department and the White House for comment.
“As I’ve said many times, for Donald Trump and the MAGAs in Congress this is not about fighting crime or public safety. This is about sowing fear, and intimidation, and division among Americans,” Pritzker said, according to prepared remarks obtained by Politico.
The Democratic governor continued: “Our small businesses suffer when our residents and visitors who are shopping and eating are made to feel unsafe by the jackbooted thugs roaming around a peaceful downtown. Parents are now scared to send their kids to school for fear the troops will grab their children. Students are afraid they will come home and find their parents have been disappeared by ICE. This is no way to live.”
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, a Democrat, also criticized the potential deployment of National Guard troops at the press conference, saying, per Politico, “This stunt has nothing to do with public safety. This is about politics, money and power.”
Johnson’s office reported last month a 21.6 percent decrease in violent crime.
Dozens of Border Patrol agents are already patrolling the streets of Chicago, targeting largely immigrant and Latino areas, the Associated Press reported.
Trump has been testing the limits of his executive power, first deploying the National Guard to Los Angeles to quell anti-ICE protesters in June, then sending guardsmen to Washington, D.C., to crack down on what he saw as a crime-ridden city, and earlier this month, he said he was sending troops to Memphis to combat crime.
Oregon and its largest city, Portland, have filed a lawsuit to block Trump from deploying guardsmen, claiming the president’s “provocative and arbitrary actions threaten to undermine public safety by inciting a public outcry.”
Trump has claimed ICE facilities in Portland are “under siege from attack by Antifa and other domestic terrorists.”
