Illinois lawmakers condemn ICE raids in Chicago, weigh state response
[October 16, 2025]
By Brenden Moore
Democratic state lawmakers on Wednesday condemned aggressive immigration
raids that in recent weeks have resulted in violent clashes between
federal agents and protestors in the Chicago region — but it remains
uncertain whether their words will translate to legislative action
during the fall session.
“History will judge those who are silent in this moment, and we’re going
to speak up today,” House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch, D-Hillside,
told reporters outside his Capitol office. “We’re going to stand up for
our democracy, and that’s our plan for today.”
Lawmakers returned to the Capitol this week for their annual fall veto
session with an already extensive agenda that included reform of the
state’s public transportation agencies and addressing soaring energy
costs and grid reliability.
An addition to the list is addressing the immigration enforcement
campaign known as “Operation Midway Blitz.” The Department of Homeland
Security claims the operation has resulted in the arrest of more than
1,000 immigrants who were living in Chicago and its suburbs without
legal permission over the past five weeks.
Violence has escalated as the operation has ramped up. Several
protestors have been arrested over the past few weeks on charges of
assaulting federal agents outside an Immigrations and Customs
Enforcement processing facility in Broadview. Agents there have sprayed
tear gas and nonlethal ammunition into crowds gathered outside the
facility.
Other conflicts have flared up. Most recently, a car chase and crash
involving federal agents resulted in a confrontation with at least 100
residents on Chicago’s Southeast Side. Agents deployed tear gas
canisters to quell the clash, which resulted in the detainment of at
least three people, according to the Chicago Tribune.
Together for the first time in more than four months, the
Democrat-controlled Illinois House — in party line votes — approved five
resolutions signaling disapproval for various aspects of the Trump
Administration. One decried “lawless actions” that have “denied people
of all types of immigration status their rights to due process.” Another
condemned politically motivated violence, “whether in the form of a mass
shooting or a mass deployment of masked troops empowered to instill
fear.”
Legislative response pending
Beyond expressing their opinions strongly, lawmakers thus far have taken
no action this week on legislation responding to the federal immigration
crackdown.
Gov. JB Pritzker told reporters after an unrelated event in Minooka on
Wednesday that lawmakers “may be able to make tweaks to the law to
protect people better in the state,” but cautioned that “there are
limits to what a state can do.”
Still, there appears to be an effort to tee up proposals for when
lawmakers return to the Capitol later this month.
One proposal being floated would prohibit civil immigration arrests
inside and around courthouses under the state’s jurisdiction. It would
not apply to federal facilities.
[to top of second column]
|
House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch joins members of his caucus at a
news conference outside of his Capitol office on Wednesday, Oct. 15,
to decry the ongoing aggressive federal immigration enforcement in
Chicago. (Capitol News Illinois photo by Peter Hancock)
Such facilities were once generally considered off limits for
immigration enforcement in a tacit understanding. But over the past
year, state courts have been the site of at least 14 civil immigration
apprehensions, according to the Illinois Coalition for Immigration and
Refugee Rights.
On Tuesday, Cook County Chief Judge Timothy Evans issued an order
barring warrantless immigration arrests of litigants and witnesses in
and around the county’s courthouses. Welch said lawmakers will consider
legislation taking that idea statewide.
“We want to look at language; we want to make sure lawyers are all on
the same page,” Welch said. “If we can do something similar statewide,
I’d love to get that done because what’s happening with these masked ICE
agents in courthouses and territories around courthouses is
unacceptable.”
Lawmakers are also expected to consider tweaks to the state’s TRUST Act,
the 2017 law that generally prohibits state and local law enforcement
from assisting federal agents with civil immigration enforcement.
The legislation filed earlier this year by state Rep. Lisa Hernandez,
D-Cicero, and state Sen. Omar Aquino, D-Chicago, would expand the
definition of an immigration agent to include anyone authorized to
arrest and detain people for immigration enforcement, including National
Guard troops. It would also clarify that campus police and school
resource officers are included in law enforcement barred from
cooperating with civil immigration enforcement.
Another bill, filed by state Sen. Laura Fine, D-Glenview, would require
school districts to notify parents, students and staff when immigration
enforcement is confirmed on campus; make health care facilities adopt
policies to prevent immigration agents from entering nonpublic treatment
areas without a judicial warrant, and boost privacy protections that
ensure automatic license plate reader data is not shared with federal
agents.
State Sen. Celina Villanueva, D-Chicago, who is the lead sponsor on the
courts measure and involved in the conversation about a broader
immigration package, said she would “fight like hell with my colleagues
in order to try to do whatever the hell we can in order to try to
protect people.”
“The reality is, the playbook that we used to play by doesn’t exist
anymore because they’re not abiding by it,” Villaneuva said. “So we’re
going to get really, really creative and try to do what we can in order
to stand up for people because this is not OK. This is not normal.”
Capitol News Illinois is
a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service that distributes state government
coverage to hundreds of news outlets statewide. It is funded primarily
by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation. |
