Here’s how Chicago is preparing as possible National Guard deployment looms
By Andy Rose, Taylor Romine, CNN
(CNN) — After weeks of warnings Chicago could be the next US city to see National Guard troops rolling through its streets, local leaders are preparing – from the governor bracing for a court fight to parade planners postponing – even while it’s still not clear troops will show up.
Officials in Illinois hear the National Guard will be in place by Friday and ready to act Saturday – in step with an expected immigration enforcement swell – but no one from the Trump administration has told the state of its plans, Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker said Wednesday.
Meanwhile, there are “no immediate plans” to send soldiers to Chicago, Vice President JD Vance told reporters Wednesday after President Donald Trump the prior day called it “the worst and most dangerous city in the World, by far” following a violent Labor Day weekend and said the feds were “going in,” though without saying when. New Orleans is also being considered for potential deployment, adding confusion as to which city will see troops.
“I don’t know if you can believe JD Vance, just like I don’t know if you can believe Donald Trump,” Pritzker said Thursday, responding to reporter questions at a news conference at a west suburban school in Berwyn.
As local officials denounce any surge of federalized troops in another Democratic-led city – and prepare for what could be dramatic raids and disruptive protests – Pritzker told community leaders Wednesday he’ll do his best to “hold the line.”
Here’s some of what he and others are doing to try to prevent or respond to US military in Chicago:
State girds for legal fight
The state will not file a lawsuit against the administration until it knows Trump’s justification for a deployment, Pritzker said Tuesday, promising if troops are activated in Chicago, legal action will follow.
“We absolutely will go into court,” the governor said.
Illinois has already proven its willingness to combat federal actions in court, joining a multistate lawsuit against the administration’s effort to cut off federal relief — including for Head Start school programs and domestic violence shelters — for people who cannot prove they have legal status to be in the United States.
“President Trump’s plan is not only bad strategy, but it is illegal,” said Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul of the expected National Guard deployment.
To protect himself legally, Pritzker is not calling the president to discuss the situation, the governor said Wednesday.
Trump is “going to end up in court, and that will be a fact that they will use in court that the governor called to ask for help, and I’m sorry, I’m not going to provide him with evidence to support his desire to have the court rule in his favor,” he said.
The governor also urged residents to be prepared to record any Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity they see to help document if federal agents are “doing something wrong or to keep them honest.” He repeated this sentiment on Thursday, adding, “Don’t play into their hands.”
“I’m telling people to know your rights, be extra careful, and know that there is the possibility that ICE will be on the ground and causing some mayhem,” Pritzker said Thursday.
City tells police not to cooperate with federal agents
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson — one of the most voluble critics of Trump’s threats to put the military on his city’s streets — issued orders over the weekend, saying the Chicago Police Department will not cooperate with federal agents in the latest White House push.
“No CPD personnel shall be assigned joint law enforcement patrols, arrest operations, or other law enforcement duties alongside federal law enforcement, or military personnel, or National Guard units engaging in civil immigration enforcement,” the order states.
An ICE blitz would come amid a nationwide deportation push that has nabbed community pillars along with alleged serious criminals. Crossing the border and being undocumented in the United States generally is a civil infraction, not a criminal one.
Johnson’s order also directs city departments to “pursue all available legal and legislative avenues to resist coordinated efforts from the federal government” that violate the rights of city residents.
“We have not called for this. Our people have not asked for this, but nevertheless, we find ourselves having to respond to this,” Johnson said before signing the executive order Saturday.
Temporary fencing will be installed outside the Everett McKinley Dirksen Courthouse, a federal building downtown, to make sure those who need to access the court are able to do so, the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois said in a statement. The court doesn’t handle deportation-related cases as they are administrative proceedings, not judicial.
The case against National Guard deployment in a US city was bolstered Tuesday in San Francisco, where a federal judge ruled the administration’s Los Angeles deployment in June broke federal law prohibiting the military from law enforcement activity on US soil in most cases; the Trump administration has appealed. Meantime, Washington, DC, sued Thursday over the National Guard deployment in the nation’s capital.
Although US District Judge Charles Breyer ordered the federal government to stand down in California, his ruling is not effective in Illinois, and Trump has shown no indication the court decision changed his intentions.
“Under prior administrations, you would expect the White House to take this extremely seriously and for it to deter them from those sorts of deployments,” former federal prosecutor Ankush Khardori told CNN’s Pamela Brown. “We do not know given the way that this administration has conducted itself whether it will actually take that position.”
Mexican Independence Day events upended
Some have raised questions about the timing of an immigration enforcement ramp-up: “We have reason to believe that (White House Deputy Chief of Staff) Stephen Miller chose the month of September to come to Chicago because of celebrations around Mexican Independence Day that happen here every year,” Pritzker said.
In response, one of the largest of the Mexican Independence Day events that typically dot Chicagoland in mid-September is getting pushed back, organizers confirmed to CNN on Thursday.
The parade and festival are celebrated every year in Waukegan, a northern suburb along Lake Michigan near Great Lakes naval base, the facility set to be used as a command center for incoming immigration agents.
“I know that the vendors perhaps are upset, but it is what it is – for the safety of the people,” said Margaret Carrasco, president of Fiesta Patrias, which is tentatively rescheduled to November 1 from September 14.
“Instead, we’re gonna let Chicago be the target, we’re going to bow out of this parade … I never thought in a million years that this would ever happen,” she added of the first postponement in the event’s 30-year history.
El Grito Chicago, a two-day festival in downtown’s Grant Park, also decided to postpone citing concerns for the “safety of our community.”
“We’re saddened about the loss of an opportunity to uplift a vision of dignity, strength, and belonging at a time when it’s sorely needed,” event organizers said in a statement.
“It breaks my heart to report that we have been told ICE will try and disrupt community picnics and peaceful parades,” Pritzker said broadly this week. “Let’s be clear: The terror and cruelty is the point, not the safety of anyone living here.”
When asked Thursday if people in the city should stay home to avoid any potential law enforcement or immigration action, Johnson rejected the idea.
“I know that the president is working hard to intimidate the people of Chicago,” he said. “I’m not intimidated. And no one should be.”
Saturday’s Mexican Independence Day Parade in the Pilsen neighborhood will go on as planned, organizer Vicky Lugo has said. But some in the largely immigrant neighborhood are scared to attend because of the potential for ICE enforcement, she said.
“We are not worried, but obviously we are taking precautions,” she said, noting the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights will be there handing out cards informing people of their rights and visiting businesses to make sure they know what to do if ICE comes.
Volunteers and marshals will monitor the parades to protect attendees and families should do what’s best for them, adding it’s important for people to celebrate their culture and traditions.
“The freedom of another country, it’s the same thing that we hear in the US,” Lugo said. “Being able to celebrate all these things have a deep significance for everyone because it’s not just about Mexican Independence Day, it’s about freedom for all.”
Suburb with ICE site preps for protests
ICE action is not just a concern to communities with large immigrant populations. Broadview, a village of about 8,000 residents a dozen miles west of downtown Chicago, is home to an ICE facility that has drawn fevered protests this year.
Now, leaders are bracing for more.
“Federal officials have informed us that a large-scale enforcement campaign will soon be underway,” Broadview Mayor Katrina Thompson told residents Tuesday in a letter.
City leaders were told the ICE building “is scheduled to operate seven days a week for approximately 45 continuous days,” she wrote.
ICE action “may draw protests and demonstrations, like those seen earlier this year in Los Angeles, where property damage and assaults against law enforcement were reported,” the mayor warned, adding the village police department will work directly with nearby businesses to prepare.
Teachers remind families of their rights
The Chicago Teachers Union started handing out flyers this week during school drop-off to remind parents and students of their legal rights in preparation for any National Guard deployment.
The flyer, in English and Spanish, tells families they have the right to remain silent, don’t have to consent to be searched and don’t have to share their birthplace or citizenship status, among other rights.
Chicago Public School teachers and union members distributed “Defend Your Rights” flyers to parents and students Friday afternoon outside a west side elementary school.
“We have so many Black and brown students here, we’ve gotten an influx within the last two years of migrant students, so we want to protect our students,” first grade teacher Latina King told CNN as she stood on the street outside her school handing out flyers to parents in their cars.
“They walk to school by themselves, they move about the neighborhood, we want them to be safe. We don’t want them to see the National Guard and be intimidated. We want them to feel safe walking to this building and back home,” King said.
King said many of the families who have children in her school are frightened about the prospect of additional ICE agents entering the community.
“We do have some families that are afraid, especially our migrant families,” she said. “Those are the ones that are afraid. And I wouldn’t be surprised if attendance drops for a while because that happened last year when the original threat came out.”
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CNN’s Whitney Wild, Bill Kirkos and Kara Devlin contributed to this report.
