Incoming "border czar" Tom Homan said large-scale raids as part of President-elect Trump's crackdown on illegal immigration are set to begin as soon as Tuesday.
In an interview with Fox News on Friday night, Homan did not offer further details, but he did confirm that Chicago will be one of the cities targeted.
"On Tuesday, ICE is finally going to go out and do their job. We're going to take the handcuffs off ICE," he said, referring to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Homan, a former acting head of ICE, added that immigration agents will focus on the "worst first, public safety threats first, but no one is off the table. If they're in the country illegally, they got a problem."
The anticipated raids in Chicago were first reported by The Wall Street Journal. It comes after Homan visited the city in December and threatened to prosecute the city's mayor if he refused to cooperate.
On Saturday, Homan told The Washington Post that the incoming administration was reconsidering launching raids in Chicago because details had leaked in the media, but had yet to make a final decision.
Chicago is one of the hundreds of sanctuary cities and counties in the U.S., which typically prohibit local resources from supporting federal immigration enforcement.
The prospect of raids in Chicago echoes Homan's past remarks that he will not allow sanctuary jurisdictions to hinder the incoming administration's crackdown on illegal immigration.
On Saturday, Beatriz Ponce de León, Chicago's deputy mayor for immigrant, migrant and refugee rights, said the news that immigration raids could start in Chicago on Tuesday "wasn't a surprise," but that "hearing confirmation made it more real, more concrete."
She said the city is prepared. In addition to community agencies holding "know your rights" events all over, she said Chicago leaders have met with city departments and sister agencies, such as the police and public school district, to detail existing city policies.
An estimated 11 million immigrants live in the U.S. without legal status.
Both Homan and Trump have vowed to carry out the largest deportation operation in U.S. history. But the plan is expected to face legal and logistical hurdles, including where to house millions of people once they are detained.
In Chicago, community organizers and elected officials scramble to encourage residents to not panic
On the city's Southwest Side, Any Huamani, a community organizer with the Brighton Park Neighborhood Council, was fielding requests for Know Your Rights Trainings and leading a rapid response team via private group chat. Team members are ready to be dispatched in case ICE agents arrive in her community.
"Obviously each scenario is different," Huamani said. "If they're there to detain someone, rapid response teams respond in a different way. We have to yell out 'These are your rights. You know, who can we call? Give us a phone number.' And we're also trying to record … ICE agents, if there's an ICE truck or if it's an unrecognizable truck."
Meanwhile, 20 requests for trainings had come in.
The biggest fear among immigrants who don't have a legal status in the U.S., Huamani said, is leaving their children behind.
During Trump's first administration, his "zero tolerance" policy separated more than 5,000 children from parents who crossed the border, without systems to track and reunite families. Some also fear being detained or held in cities or states unfamiliar to them. Huamani has been advising people at risk of being detained by ICE to memorize at least three phone numbers so that they can be located if taken into ICE custody.
Organizers are worried that ICE agents could target the city's Southwest Side and execute workplace raids in nearby suburbs, where there are also large concentrations of immigrants without legal status.
Garien Gatewood, Chicago's deputy mayor of community safety, said the police department has been working under a welcoming city ordinance for 40 years, which stipulates that immigration enforcement is up to the federal government.
Chicago's police department does not document immigration status, nor share information with federal immigration authorities, said spokesman Don Terry in a statement. But he added that police "will not intervene or interfere with any other government agencies performing their duties."
"From the top down, everybody at CPD understands the roles that they play," he said. "This is not the first time that they've had interactions with federal agents acting about immigration status."
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker's office did not provide a response to news that immigration raids were going to start in Chicago next week. The office provided a transcript of the governor's statement at a Dec. 11 press conference where he said he "believes it is his obligation to protect" immigrants without legal status who have not committed violent crimes.
WBEZ has more on how Chicago is preparing for the incoming Trump administration.
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