By Victoria Drzewiecka and Arturo Gutierrez
@redlineproject
Editor’s note: One source is identified only by her first name. AI was used to translate on interview from Spanish to English.
On the morning of Oct. 9, Jose Dominguez’s father was detained by ICE officers at a laundromat on the Chicago’s North Side.
This motivated Dominguez, who’s in his 20s, to protest at the Broadview ICE facility where detainees are processed by federal agents. The protests have garnered national attention due to escalating confrontations between ICE agents and residents.
“This is my first time actually protesting,” he said. “[For the] same reason, they took my dad in. So I feel like I should be out here. I have no clue what my dad is going through right now. I don’t know if he’s going to eat tonight.”
The Broadview Processing Facility, where US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operates, has become a major hotspot for protests. The facility has served as an operations center for federal agents for nearly 20 years and has remained controversial within its community.
With the increased ICE presence in Chicago throughout the fall, citizens such as Dominguez have flocked to the Broadview Processing Center in hopes of having their voices heard. However, this year has marked a turning point for the Broadview facility.
As of Nov. 24, the Department of Homeland Security estimates that more than 1,000 immigrants have been arrested in Chicago.
According to The Guardian, more than 97% of immigrants detained in the Trump administration’s “Operation Midway Blitz” in Chicago had no criminal conviction, according to federal court records. A similar study by the NY Times in December showed that only 3 percent of ICE detainees have committed a violent crime.
Operation Midway Blitz started on Sept. 9 in honor of Katie Abraham and her friend Chloe Polzin, who were killed in a drunk driving hit-and-run incident by Julio Cucul-Bol, an undocumented immigrant.
Rocky Valle, a Spanish-speaking Latino who has called Chicago his home for 20 years, suddenly found himself in fear since the emergence of Operation Midway Blitz, which has affected his day-to-day life.
Read more: Little Village vendors stand despite ICE raids | Essay: Operation Midway Blitz violating due process, other legal standards
“Nobody goes near the places where there have been the most raids anymore,” Valle said. “In this case, that would be Little Village on 26th Street. A lot of people used to love going there to walk around, to shop, and well, now they’re just not going anymore. That’s really hurting the businesses there, too, because they’re not getting any sales.”
Once a neighborhood filled with families, Little Village’s foot traffic is now deserted due to fears of ICE raids.
“It’s been really tough because in all my 20 years living in Chicago, I had never been afraid to go out on the street, not even during the pandemic, but now it felt like a direct attack just because of how you look,” Valle said. “If you don’t look white, if you’re brown, short, dark-skinned, they went after you immediately. Even U.S. citizens had to walk around terrified, carrying their papers, because if they didn’t, they were going to get grabbed.”
Community Response to ICE Presence
Protests rapidly increased after Trump deployed the Texas National Guard to Chicago. On Aug. 22, Trump told reporters, “When we’re ready, we’ll go in and we’ll straighten out Chicago just like we did DC.”
The National Guard arrived at Broadview on Oct. 8. Approximately 200 soldiers came in from Texas to protect the ICE facility and U.S. government personnel.
U.S. District Judge April Perry issued a temporary restraining order against troop action on Oct.9, which would last 14 days. The order was established based on a lack of justification for the Guard’s presence. On Oct. 22, the Department of Justice agreed to extend the order for 30 more days.
On Nov. 14, NORTHCOM issued a statement on X: “The Department will be shifting and/or rightsizing our Title 10 footprint in Portland, Los Angeles, and Chicago to ensure a constant, enduring, and long-term presence in each city.”
All 200 National Guard soldiers have since returned to Texas.
Citizens took to the streets in the early weeks of September to voice their disapproval of increased immigration enforcement within Chicago. With each day, tensions among residents grew. Protests began sparking up all over Chicagoland, spanning from downtown to the suburbs.
Protesters at the Broadview Facility were occasionally met with tear gas, pepper spray, rubber bullets, and unlawful detainment. First responders, officers, and journalists were reported to have been caught in the crossfire between ICE and protesters, making the environment dangerous to all individuals.
When asked for comment on the protests and confrontations, Broadview Police Chief Thomas Mills did not respond to inquiries.
To combat physical attacks, citizens set up tents with the necessary equipment for protesters. Some equipment used by protesters was swimming goggles, N95 masks, and first-aid kits.
A resident of the northwest suburbs, Demaris, who is being identified by only her first name, was one of the people who helped operate the tents.
“Generally, we are out here in this space every day to support the community as they’re protesting, to make sure that everybody has water,” Demaris said, “when we do get attacked with chemical agents, we make sure that we have saline and water on hand to flush eyes, things to clean their hands, more shirts to change their clothes.”
Before Demaris worked with the relief tents, she visited the facility as a protester.
“My very first time out here, I came with just sunglasses,” she said. “I had no idea what was going on. There wasn’t really anywhere I could go for information. While I was out there and they were shooting pepper balls and tear gassing us, somebody handed me swimming glasses, like swimming goggles, to protect my face, right? Somebody gave me an N95 mask. We were all taking care of each other.”
This act of kindness sparked a fire in Demaris that has yet to burn out.
“The goal here is to make sure that the protestors are protected and supported,” she said. “It’s to help have a unified space to center the community.”
Federal Response to Protestors
Soldiers arrived at the Broadview Facility on the evening of Oct.8. The following day, citizens gathered at the facility to protest their arrival.
Frances Bonnie, an independent freelance reporter, observed the protests days prior to the National Guard’s arrival.
“I was following the situation closely, and there’s a lot of rhetoric around what the situation is like,” she said. “I’ve heard it described as an insurrection, a war zone, saying the city’s on fire. What I found in the last three days actually being here is in stark contrast to what was portrayed.”
Other protesters share similar sentiments: There is not as much violence occurring at the processing facility as some are led to believe.
“I would invite them to come spend a day, an hour, a few minutes here to see that a lot of the clashes between protestors and ICE are manufactured, to capture the footage that’s making them so afraid,” Demaris said. “They are fear-inciting tactics, not for us as protestors or not for the citizens of Broadview, but for the larger world [that] doesn’t have the ability to be here with us.”
The National Guard departed from the facility less than a week later, due to a restraining order issued by a federal judge.
From Broadview to Other Areas
Since Operation Midway Blitz, ICE raids are no longer confined to Broadview, but have spread all across Chicago and suburban neighborhoods.
Department of Homeland Security news releases, press conferences, and TV ads claim it’s removing “worst of the worst,” citing arrests of gang members, pedophiles, and murderers.
However, the raids have been described as “excessive” and “unpleasant” by many residents and protesters.
According to an analysis of Google search data, searches for ICE raids, DHS, and Broadview ICE have increased in Chicago since the start of Operation Midway Blitz.
Protests continue near the Broadview ICE Facility, with the most recent resulting in over 20 protesters getting arrested on Nov. 14. Both the National Guard and the relief tents have been removed since then.
Resources
If you or someone you know encounters ICE
- Call the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights at 312–332–7360
- Call the National Immigrant Justice Center at 312–660–1370
Listen
Victoria Drzewiecka talks about reporting and writing this story.