The U.S. Department of Homeland Security sent a memo to the Defense Department requesting 100 military personnel be sent to Chicago, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker announced during a press conference Monday.
“We are here standing together — elected officials, business leaders, the faith community, law enforcement, educators, community organizations, and more — united in our opposition to these flagrant abuses of power by the federal government,” Pritzker said. “With one voice, we are telling this unwarranted and unconstitutional occupation to get out of Chicago.”
On Sunday, U.S. Border Patrol agents wearing bulletproof vests and carrying rifles marched through downtown Chicago, which Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, in a social media post, called “another brazen provocation from the Trump administration.”
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents fired rubber pellets, tear gas and other chemicals at protesters outside an ICE facility in Broadview, Illinois, west of Chicago on Friday, and at least two people were arrested, according to local news reports. In a Friday letter to the ICE field office director, Broadview Mayor Katrina Thompson said ICE was endangering residents and harming Broadview’s police and firefighters.
U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi announced Monday that the Department of Justice is “deploying agents to protect ICE facilities, arrest violent agitators on the spot, and bring the strongest federal charges possible.”
