US federal authorities have begun immigration raids in Chicago, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) statement confirmed on Sunday, just days after incoming “border tsar”, Tom Homan, said officials were “reconsidering” after details were leaked to the press.
In a statement, Ice said its agents, along with several other organisations including the FBI, had begun conducting “enhanced targeted operations” in Chicago “to enforce US immigration law and preserve public safety and national security by keeping potentially dangerous criminal aliens out of our communities”.
Chicago, which Trump administration officials have warned would be Ground Zero for immigration enforcement actions, has been on edge over the initiation of deportation raids. Many of the regions’ estimated 400,000 undocumented people are believed to have stayed home to avoid possible interactions with federal law enforcement.
On Friday, federal officials approached a school on Chicago’s southwest side but initial reports that immigration and customs enforcement officers were involved proved incorrect.
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Donald Trump signed a flurry of executive orders last week designed to reverse Biden-era immigration policies and declared a state of emergency at the US-Mexico border, allowing federal agencies to step up law enforcement actions, including deportations to anyone deemed a national security threat.
The department of justice has directed federal prosecutors to investigate state or local officials perceived to be interfering with immigration policies. Under an executive directive, law enforcement are permitted to arrest people at locations such as schools and churches where immigration enforcement action was previously blocked.
“Criminals will no longer be able to hide in America’s schools and churches to avoid arrest,” the department of homeland security said in a statement. But deportation flights for some of those already arrested have met resistance.
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Colombian president Gustavo Petro said Sunday his country will not accept deportation flights from the US until the Trump administration provides a process to treat Colombian migrants with “dignity and respect”.
Trump said he had been informed that two repatriation flights to Colombia had not been allowed to land in country.
“Petro’s denial of these flights has jeopardised the national security and public safety of the United States, so I have directed my administration to immediately take the following urgent and decisive retaliatory measures,” Trump posted on Truth Social.
The US president said he had doubled tariffs on Colombia to 50 per cent; banned travel to the US for Colombian government officials; and placed enhanced customs and border protection inspections of all Colombian nationals and cargo coming into the US on national security grounds.
“These measures are just the beginning,” Trump added. “We will not allow the Colombian government to violate its legal obligations with regard to the acceptance and return of the criminals they forced into the United States!”
While the administration’s migrant deportation efforts are focused on lawbreakers and people involved in gang activity, including members of Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua and El Salvador’s Mara Salvatrucha, commonly known as MS-13, officials have not ruled out detaining others who may be swept up in arrest actions.
Before Trump was inaugurated last week, unnamed officials said immigration officers would target more than 300 people, focusing on those with histories of violent crimes, in the Chicago area.
The Wall Street Journal, which first reported news of the operation, said Ice would send between 100-200 officers to carry out the operation. But an official with the new administration told Reuters that Chicago would not be a special focus.
Local and state Democratic leaders, including Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson and Illinois governor JB Pritzker, have vowed to protect immigrant Chicagoans from any planned raids.
“Ripping those families apart, not acceptable to Americans,” Pritzker said after Trump took office. He said that noncitizens convicted of violent crimes should be deported, but that they should separated from law-abiding migrants.
“We’re going to stand up for them in the state of Illinois and do everything that we can to protect them,” Pritzer said. “They’re good for our state. They’re good for our economy. They’re paying taxes. These are law-abiding people who are stabilising communities often.” – Guardian
