A top Department of Justice official — and former criminal defense attorney for Donald Trump — joined federal law enforcement agents and administration officials on the ground in Chicago this weekend to carry out a series of immigration arrests after weeks of heightened tensions among immigrant communities bracing for threats.
Trump’s border czar Tom Homan was joined by acting deputy U.S. Attorney General Emil Bove, along with officials from the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration and other agencies after the Department of Homeland Security broadly expanded immigration enforcement authorities across federal law enforcement.
The groups were also joined by Phil McGraw, aka television personality Dr. Phil, who joined agents for ride-alongs and used the raids and arrests as content for his newly launched Merit TV platform.
“We will support everyone at the federal, state and local levels who joins this critical mission to take back our communities,” said Bove, who was selected for the third-highest role at the Justice Department after representing Trump during his so-called hush money trial.
“We will use all available tools to address obstruction and other unlawful impediments to our efforts to protect the homeland,” he added. “Most importantly, we will not rest until the work is done.”
A statement from Immigration and Customs Enforcement labeled the actions “enhanced targeted operations” designed to “enforce U.S. immigration law and preserve public safety and national security by keeping potentially dangerous criminal aliens out of our communities.”
The agency reported the arrests of 286 people on Saturday and 956 people on Sunday in operations across the country.
Communities are ‘frightened’ and confused
Chicago-area residents started to see ICE agents and unmarked black trucks appear in their neighborhoods early on Sunday morning.
Melissa’s parents hid in their attic after they saw ICE agents arrive outside their home on Sunday morning. “They took our neighbor’s dad,” she told the Chicago Tribune. “My parents were crying. We are terrified.”
She told the newspaper that her family had been in the country for more than two decades. She said her parents do not have a criminal record.
Another woman, a volunteer with a nonprofit group that runs a food pantry, told the newspaper she had received a threatening phone call days before the raids telling her “if there were a lot of migrants at the pantry, you better hope ICE doesn’t show up.”
She hung up the phone immediately.
“The community is very frightened,” Nubia Willman, chief programs officer with Chicago’s Latinos Progresando, told The Independent.
Families are pulling children out of school, even in families with lawful status, over a climate of “heightened anxiety and fear,” she said
Following Trump’s election, Homan gloated to Chicago Republicans that the Windy City would be ground zero for the president’s large-scale deportation operation. Immigrant advocacy and civil rights groups told The Independent they have been working with communities to provide legal aid and “know your rights” training to prepare for any potential law enforcement interactions.
A blitz of executive actions and shifting policies within Trump’s first week in office has created a dizzying amount of confusion and disinformation within immigrant communities, Willman said.
Communities are also on high alert after Chicago school officials initially reported that ICE agents were blocked from entering an elementary school.
On Friday, Chicago Public Schools officials held a press conference alleging ICE agents had tried to enter a majority-Latino elementary school in the south side of Chicago, days after the Trump administration rescinded policy that prevented enforcement actions in places like schools, churches and other “sensitive” areas.
But the agents turned out to be with the Secret Service — which also operates under Homeland Security — responding to an unrelated threat.
Chicago’s Welcoming City Ordinance limits local law enforcement cooperation with federal immigration authorities in most cases. The ordinance does not stop federal authorities from doing work within their jurisdiction, but “these types of laws create a barrier” to ensure constitutional rights are protected, Willman said.
Dr. Phil’s made-for-TV ‘stunt’
On his Merit TV, McGraw can be seen with Homan approaching a man in handcuffs early Sunday morning
“What have you been charged with?” McGraw asked him.
“Charged with?” the main replied.
“Before,” McGraw responded.
“I’m not going to say nothing,” the man said. “I want to talk to my lawyer.”
McGraw continued to question him, including asking whether or his family members are citizens.
His apparent attempt to extract an admission from a suspect was roundly condemned by civil rights groups.
“If they think that kind of thing is going to lend credibility … that will be a mistake,” according to Ed Yohnka, director of communications and public policy at the ACLU of Illinois.
The spectacle of large-scale arrests was more of a made-for-TV “stunt” than “any kind of meaningful type of immigration enforcement,” he told The Independent.
The arrests were largely “targeted arrests with a judicial warrant that were following protocols that had been in place for a long time,” and “didn’t involve the mass dragnet that had been predicted,” he said.
“It was done in a way that creates more fear and confusion,” he said. “It not only appears to be a show of force but a show of force for purposes of making a political statement.”
Homan told McGraw that federal authorities were targeting 300 people in Chicago, including 150 people who had previously been held in police custody.
Lawsuit blasts ‘brazen’ threats to immigrants
One day before federal agents descended on the city, a coalition of immigrant advocacy groups and community organizations sued the Trump administration for its “brazen attempt to stomp out the sanctuary city movement and run roughshod over the First Amendment.”
The lawsuit from Organized Communities Against Deportation, Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, Brighton Park Neighborhood Council and Raise the Floor Alliance argues that the administration is illegally targeting Chicago for its status as as sanctuary city, and that threats to revoke federal funding and deport immigrants are likely violations of the First and Fourth amendments.
Threats are already forcing communities to cancel Spanish-language church services and other gatherings out of fear that they will become targets.
“Plaintiffs — each on its own behalf and on behalf of its membership, wish to continue engaging in their First Amendment-protected activities to the fullest extent possible, but, as a result of defendants’ past, present, and likely future conduct, are deterred from doing so,” according to the lawsuit.