As immigration arrests spike in Chicago, activists escalate tactics to fight back

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CHICAGO (AP) — As encounters with federal immigration agents around Chicago increase, tactics used by activists and immigrant leaders to fight back are also escalating.

The Trump administration has singled out Chicago as its latest mark for immigration enforcement, using traffic stops in immigrant-heavy areas and targeting day laborers outside hardware stores.

“We will not back down,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem posted Thursday on X, recirculating dramatic footage of arrests at a suburban Chicago home days earlier.

Activists and local leaders are also defiant, trying to deter agents, warn residents and keep attention on a man killed by an immigration officer last week.

As U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement launched a new operation this month, the focus appeared to be on traffic stops in largely immigrant and Latino neighborhoods and suburbs. This week, activists say arrests of day laborers are on the rise, echoing enforcement trends elsewhere.

Federal agents were spotted at roughly half a dozen Home Depot and Menards stores in the Chicago area, resulting in individual arrests, according to activists.

“Our neighbors who build, paint, fix and beautify this city have been the target of these unwarranted attacks,” said Miguel Alvelo Rivera with the Latino Union, which advocates for day laborers.

He spoke Thursday near a Home Depot in the heavily Latino Brighton Park neighborhood where ICE agents were spotted a day earlier.

In immigrant and activist circles, the arrests are commonly referred to as abductions because many agents wear masks, drive unmarked vehicles and don’t have insignia on their clothes.

Giselle Maldonado, 23, said two of her uncles -- Gabriel Soto-Rivera, 40, and Eder Nicolas Jimenez Barrios, 37 -- were detained Monday by ICE in Chicago as they were driving to work as HVAC technicians. She found out through social media videos.

Maldonado said she immediately thought of Gabriel’s two young children.

“Who’s going to be there for them?” she said. “They’re babies.”

Chicago’s activists have quickly dispatched volunteers to sightings of immigration agents. They record video and gather information to notify families.

Activists circulate the license plates of suspected ICE vehicles on social media and take part in disruptive demonstrations outside hotels where agents are believed to be staying. Bike patrols look out for agents, while some follow vehicles on foot and warn those in the vicinity.

One neighborhood on Chicago's southwest side is making a lot of noise, literally.

When word of increased enforcement in Chicago ramped up, Baltazar Enriquez started buying orange emergency whistles to warn others of nearby ICE agents. He said they are reliable even when technology fails.

“If they hear that sound, they immediately start closing their doors, locking their gates,” he said of neighbors. “This has worked for us here. People are asking us, ‘Can I get a whistle?’ ”

Arrests have been difficult to track. The Department of Homeland Security has offered details on a few dozen, while an Illinois congresswoman briefed by ICE this week said the number was 250.

However, skepticism remains as some information circulated by ICE included out-of state-arrests. In at least two instances, U.S. citizens were taken into custody.

Before dawn on Tuesday, federal agents, Noem and Gregory Bovino, a Border Patrol agent central to a Los Angeles operation, stormed a home in suburban Elgin. They blew open a door as helicopters hovered.

Elected officials deemed it a stunt. DHS said five people were arrested. They were filmed for videos later posted to Noem’s social media accounts.

Joe Botello, who was born in Texas, told Chicago media outlets he was among the men kept in handcuffs until he showed identification. DHS confirmed he was in custody, but disputed the characterization as an arrest.

“No U.S. citizen was arrested, they were briefly held for their and officers’ safety while the operation in the house was underway,” DHS said.

Another man arrested at the home was ordered released without bond Thursday as his case continues, with Magistrate Judge Keri Holleb Hotaling noting Carlos Augusto Gonzalez-Leon “has a criminal history of nothing.” In court records, federal officials said he was previously arrested and deported to Mexico at least three times between 2013 and 2022.

His lawyer, Daniel Hesler, described Gonzalez-Leon as a hard worker who is providing for his family, including a wife in hospice care.

In another suburb, a U.S. citizen was hit with a stun gun and briefly held by a federal agent outside a gas station. U.S.-born Edgar Ruiz was sitting in a vehicle in suburban Des Plaines on Tuesday with his brother and father when an unidentified agent approached, according to family attorney George Gomez.

The agent had a weapon, which alarmed them. Ruiz ran and was hit repeatedly with a stun gun, Gomez said. He was released after being “tied up” by agents. But his father, who doesn’t have legal permission to stay in the U.S., was detained.

The death of a Mexican man at the hands of ICE agents has drawn questions from the president of Mexico and many Illinois elected officials.

Authorities say immigration agents were pursuing a man with a history of reckless driving who had entered the country illegally. They have said Silverio Villegas Gonzalez evaded arrest and dragged an officer with his vehicle. DHS said the officer fired because he feared for his life.

Noem praised the unnamed officer as brave, referring to Gonzalez as “a criminal illegal alien” who resisted arrest.

Many in suburban Franklin Park doubt authorities’ claims, remembering him at a vigil as a kind family man.

Gonzalez, who worked as a cook, had dropped off one of his children at day care that morning.

“He took the time to talk to the teachers about anything going on in the classroom. He was easy to get a hold of. He was always very respectful to the staff,” said Mary Meier, director of the Small World Learning Center in Franklin Park.

The 38-year-old was from the state of Michoacan in western Mexico, according to the Consulate General of Mexico in Chicago, which said it would “closely monitor” the investigation.