{"id":334250,"date":"2025-10-26T17:00:21","date_gmt":"2025-10-26T17:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/334250\/"},"modified":"2025-10-26T17:00:21","modified_gmt":"2025-10-26T17:00:21","slug":"chicago-police-try-to-do-jobs-follow-orders-during-aggressive-blitz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/334250\/","title":{"rendered":"Chicago police try to do jobs, follow orders during aggressive ‘blitz’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Federal agents had just sped away from a working-class residential block in Chicago\u2019s East Side neighborhood when a white-shirted Chicago police officer took a deep breath, ducked under a running garden hose and stayed there for several moments. Tear gas still hung in the air and residents were still collecting themselves.<\/p>\n

The officer scrubbed at his damp face. He was one of several supervisors who had stood to the side as a crowd of angry neighbors gathered around Border Patrol agents who crashed a car at the intersection of 105th Street and Avenue N.<\/p>\n

When people started to throw things, agents filled the block with riot control gas<\/a> and drove off, leaving disoriented neighbors and police behind.<\/p>\n

Chicago police have found themselves in a curious position as the Trump administration\u2019s Operation Midway Blitz has rolled out across Chicago. City and state laws generally bar the Chicago Police Department from assisting federal immigration enforcement operations, but local police are still obligated to maintain order and public safety on the streets.<\/p>\n

On at least two occasions \u2014 in Brighton Park and East Side \u2014 CPD personnel responding to standoffs between neighbors and federal agents have found themselves tear-gassed alongside residents as agents react to thrown objects and shouted insults.<\/p>\n

\"ChicagoChicago police officers are exposed to a chemical agent after arriving on the scene where a protester was shot by a federal immigration agent in the 3900 block of South Kedzie Avenue in Chicago’s Brighton Park neighborhood on Oct. 4, 2025. (Ryan Garza)<\/p>\n

As of Friday, agents had deployed tear gas in a total of six neighborhoods, most recently in Little Village<\/a> and Lakeview<\/a> . A total of 40 officers have been exposed to the gas.<\/p>\n

Elsewhere in the Chicago area, police and fire personnel have also faced federal agents\u2019 aggressive crowd-control tactics, in another headache for local authorities. An early point of contention for Broadview Mayor Katrina Thompson<\/a> was the repeated exposure to tear gas and pepper balls for the police and fire department members tasked with responding to conflicts outside the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement processing center located in the western suburb.<\/p>\n

Chicago Police Department members who spoke to the Tribune, asking their names be withheld, said skirmishes like the ones in East Side or Brighton Park were \u201ca mess\u201d and would remain so until the department issued better guidance on how to handle them.<\/p>\n

The Tribune interviewed police officers across several ranks stationed throughout the city who have had different levels of interaction with federal agents, granting anonymity to them so they could speak candidly about their role in Trump\u2019s \u201cblitz.\u201d<\/p>\n

Many officers blamed residents who threw things at agents as much as they did ICE or Border Patrol personnel themselves for the frightening, chaotic endings to those confrontations. In a statement to the Tribune, U.S. Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin accused local leaders of preventing police from \u201cproperly protecting their (city)\u201d and claimed that police were refusing to assist federal agents who called for help.<\/p>\n

Chicago police, for their part, held a range of views on how they should or should not be involved in federal immigration enforcement. But several observed that in recent weeks,\u00a0federal officers often seemed to be letting their emotions get the better of them.<\/p>\n

\u201cChill the hell out,\u201d one officer said of federal agents. \u201cSomeone throwing something at you might hurt you, but it\u2019s not gonna kill you.\u201d<\/p>\n

Conversely, the officer acknowledged, \u201cTear gas isn\u2019t going to kill us either,\u201d but said the use of chemical crowd control without any warning and lack of communication between federal agents and officers made already tense situations worse and hampered or incapacitated police who are trying to execute basic public safety responsibilities.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe appreciate what they\u2019re doing,\u201d the officer said. \u201cBut there\u2019s a better way to go about this.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI am not on anybody\u2019s side\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Chicago\u2019s self-declared \u201csanctuary city\u201d status and the Illinois TRUST Act both generally prohibit state and local law enforcement agencies from assisting federal agents with immigration enforcement. But as residents gather and tensions rise on the heels of shootings, car crashes and other highly visible enforcement efforts, cops are still tasked with keeping order.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s kind of confusing,\u201d one officer said. \u201cBut as complicated as it is in some ways, it\u2019s very simple in others. We\u2019re just talking about the basics \u2014 the minimum of what we need to do to protect everybody involved.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ChicagoChicago police create a barrier between federal agents and members of the community as people protest near the 3900 block of South Kedzie Avenue in Chicago’s Brighton Park neighborhood on Oct. 4, 2025. (Armando L. Sanchez\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n

Many said they saw CPD\u2019s job as being a \u201cwedge\u201d between two adversarial groups, similar to many other disturbances the department might respond to. A few noted that they routinely deal with confrontations where emotions are running high and which they may or may not disagree with personally.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf ICE is going to take enforcement action, that\u2019s completely separate from what we do,\u201d another officer said. \u201cI am not on anybody\u2019s side. But my actions are very often seen as political actions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Several referred to police as \u201cpawns\u201d in a political chess game captained by the president on one side and state and local leaders on the other.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re just stuck in the middle of it,\u201d another said. \u201cI don\u2019t think you could ever find a happy place for CPD in this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some expressed sympathy for federal agents who have released gas, shot pepper balls or otherwise physically confronted civilians. One officer said residents need to understand that \u201cICE is a law enforcement agency, and when you have people throwing things at the police \u2026 you have to expect things are not going to go in your favor if you do.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe leading reason for police use of force is lack of compliance,\u201d that department member said. \u201cI\u2019m a law enforcement officer. I\u2019ve had people defy things I\u2019ve needed done and had to get physical.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another officer said the main role for a local police force is to \u201cprotect life and property and keep the peace,\u201d so that would include protecting federal immigration enforcement agents if they\u2019re in a bind on the streets.<\/p>\n

\"ChicagoChicago police push back activists and members of the community at a flashpoint with federal agents in the 3900 block of South Kedzie Avenue in Chicago on Oct. 4, 2025. (Armando L. Sanchez\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n

But where it gets muddled, he said, is during protests, when citizens protesting against ICE and Border Patrol personnel see Chicago police officers protecting the federal officers. He said a normal citizen might think, albeit erroneously in his view, that Chicago police\u2019s efforts in that situation are helping the federal officers with immigration enforcement when they aren\u2019t.<\/p>\n

The officer also noted that the federal officers\u2019 decisions to use force are different from those typically made by Chicago police officers during volatile situations.<\/p>\n

\u201cTactically, they\u2019ve been very quick to use tear gas and pepper spray,\u201d the officer said of the federal agents.<\/p>\n

However, in 2020 in the wake of George Floyd\u2019s murder, CPD was caught flat-footed during widespread looting and unrest in the downtown area. In the years since, especially in the lead-up to the August 2024 Democratic National Convention, CPD officers underwent days of additional crowd control training.<\/p>\n

Large crowds are a common challenge for the city\u2019s police, and CPD officers have overseen countless protest marches in and around downtown over the last decade. For permitted marches, organizers share route plans with the police and officers are able to block vehicle traffic as needed.<\/p>\n

Several said the current tensions in the city paled in comparison to the unrest of 2020, but said federal agents were making their jobs, along with CPD\u2019s job, harder by not communicating about their movements or their plans to deploy chemical crowd controls.<\/p>\n

One officer remembered that police districts used to get a heads-up about federal law enforcement activity taking place nearby: \u201cIf DHS was going to be in the district, they would call with a heads-up, like \u2018Hey, we\u2019re going to be working in the district in the area of 26th and Kedzie between 8 and 10,\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cThey don\u2019t seem to do that anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another said that while CPD wasn\u2019t able to assist with enforcement, it might be able to help prevent escalations at tense scenes. But the way things are now, \u201cthe crowd is already on (federal agents) by the time we get there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not cooperation,\u201d that officer said. \u201cIt\u2019s communication. It\u2019s not marriage. It\u2019s not a long-term thing. But we\u2019re dating. As a courtesy, you should say, \u2018I\u2019m going to go to 105th and Avenue N with my friends.\u2019 And I\u2019d be like, \u2018Cool. I\u2019m gonna go to 105th and Avenue N with my friends too.’\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ChicagoChicago police assist federal officers as members of the community and activists protest near the 3900 block of South Kedzie Avenue in Chicago’s Brighton Park neighborhood on Oct. 4, 2025. (Armando L. Sanchez\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n

Following the Brighton Park clash, Superintendent Larry Snelling on Oct. 6 declared<\/a> that \u201cmy officers are not political pawns\u201d and told reporters that he had \u201chad a conversation\u201d with federal authorities \u201cabout how we were going to work this out\u201d and improve communication.<\/p>\n

The standoff on the East Side took place the following week. Another 13 officers were exposed to tear gas.<\/p>\n

A range of opinions<\/strong><\/p>\n

Police who discussed federal action in the city had a range of views on the politics of Operation Midway Blitz and said that while police officers tend to lean Republican, CPD\u2019s 11,000-plus department members hold a vast spectrum of opinions.<\/p>\n

One Chicago police homicide detective said his workload is so intense that any assistance from the federal government would help, including from immigration enforcement. He said in the last year, he can think of a couple of homicide cases he\u2019s handling in which the suspects or victims are undocumented immigrants.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd if those people weren\u2019t here, would that have happened? Probably not,\u201d the detective said. \u201cThe president said he was going to do this stuff and he\u2019s doing it. And they\u2019re (his critics) just pissed that he\u2019s doing it.\u201d<\/p>\n

A big reason the detective welcomed help from the federal government is because of the level of violence in the city. While homicides in Chicago have gone down sharply<\/a> in the last several years \u2014 a statistic many Trump opponents like to point out \u2014 the city still leads the country in homicides in sheer numbers every year.<\/p>\n

\u201cReal life, you can\u2019t follow pie charts. You can\u2019t follow graphs,\u201d the detective said. \u201cThey\u2019re not on the street dealing with the murders, dealing with the families and the aftershock that I have to deal with. I have to get the phone calls of the families of the dead people. \u2026 I have one mother who calls me every week because I don\u2019t have the time or ability to work the case.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ChicagoChicago police officers hold back the crowd as federal immigration officers depart on Oct. 23, 2025, after a raid at the Discount Mall on West 26th Street in Little Village. (Brian Cassella\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n

Another officer liked the idea that federal agents were rounding up \u201cthe really rotten ones\u201d but saw merit in \u201carguments all the way around the table\u201d for different ways to handle unauthorized immigration.<\/p>\n

Others thought that \u201cit seems like there\u2019s a better way they could go about it\u201d and questioned the purpose of apprehending \u201csomeone that\u2019s been here 30 years, just kind of minding their own business.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAre we going to go after the lady who has a tamale cart on 26th Street?\u201d one officer said. \u201cShould we be rounding them up and stopping them?\u201d<\/p>\n

And yet another officer \u2014 who said he witnessed the feds arrest an elderly man while he was off duty \u2014 said he saw potential Fourth Amendment violations in some of the arrests conducted.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou could call it illegal,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Many Chicago cops are Latino, another officer said. Their parents are from Mexico. And those officers have strong feelings \u201cabout people getting picked up off the street\u201d and being profiled. The officer said the federal government should spend more time going after criminals rather than someone who has a clean record other than entering the U.S. illegally.<\/p>\n

\"AA woman is held by police as angry crowds face off with federal agents after a raid at Discount Mall on West 26th Street Chicago’s Little Village neighborhood on\u00a0Oct 23, 2025. (Antonio Perez\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n

But others are hard-line supporters of the arrests and deportations, even for people without a criminal record or who were neighborhood stalwarts making positive contributions.<\/p>\n

\u201cGet \u2019em all \u2014 should we not write tickets on cars that don\u2019t have city stickers? We can\u2019t pick and choose,\u201d another officer said.<\/p>\n

At the same time, the officer continued, some department members had parents who themselves were in the country without authorization and are \u201cvery against ICE.\u201d And on the other end of the spectrum, \u201ceven worse than I am,\u201d were some police officers whose parents came to the country legally and had to wait years to bring a spouse or other family over.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only thing we can all agree on is, if you shoot a cop, you\u2019re going to jail, minimum,\u201d the officer said. \u201cBut then we all want to know if it was a dirty cop.\u201d<\/p>\n

Interrupting the normal<\/p>\n

A retirement party was underway in the South Chicago (4th) District the day that federal agents and residents confronted each other at 105th Street and Avenue N. Some of the people there were watching news coverage of the standoff on their phones and knew that agents had deployed tear gas, but not that CPD officers had gotten caught up in it.<\/p>\n

Then cops began to come back to the station from the scene, at 103rd and Luella Avenue. One group had been downwind. Another had not. One officer who was present for their return described the second group as \u201ca hot mess.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was at least the second time police had been present and unprepared for the use of chemical crowd controls. A memo went out from now-former First Deputy Superintendent Yolanda Talley directing all officers to have their helmets and gas masks easily accessible at all times until further notice later that afternoon.<\/p>\n

Some officers told the Tribune they or people they worked with hadn\u2019t been issued gas masks, and that the department seemed to be playing catch-up on issuing protective equipment. CPD representatives denied that the department was seeing a gas mask shortage and said officers were given their masks after being trained for their specific assignment. Varying assignments mean that not everyone gets assigned a mask.<\/p>\n

\"AA federal officer points a crowd control weapon out the window of a vehicle at protesters while Chicago police Cmdr. Lazaro Altamirano walks past as police clear the crowd for their exit on Oct. 23, 2025, after a raid at Discount Mall on West 26th Street in Little Village. (Brian Cassella\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n

Officers were frustrated with federal agents for not issuing warnings before they deployed gas, flash-bangs or pepper balls. But many also blamed people who have made it their mission to throw sticks in federal gears by tailing ICE, blowing whistles or throwing things at agents.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe cannot erase the law because the results make us feel a certain way,\u201d one officer said. \u201cPeople are adding their emotions and that\u2019s what\u2019s creating the resistance.\u201d<\/p>\n

That officer was sympathetic to the wrenching stories that have surfaced about the families who are being separated as a result of the deportations, nodding to one he\u2019d seen about a man who had resided in the U.S. for 30 years before his arrest.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt truly is a sad story,\u201d the officer said. \u201cBut if you look at the law, he was in violation 30 years ago. You have to move to get the laws changed.\u201d<\/p>\n

But that same officer and others noted that the emotions were running high on all sides. Another department member said ICE and other federal agents should be tougher and learn to withstand provocation without creating more chaos.<\/p>\n

\u201cICE isn\u2019t like CPD,\u201d the officer said. \u201cEither handle your (expletive) or don\u2019t gas us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tribune\u2019s Sam Charles contributed.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Federal agents had just sped away from a working-class residential block in Chicago\u2019s East Side neighborhood when a…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":334251,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5124],"tags":[960,5295,5386,1818,409,2765,1370,50,80],"class_list":{"0":"post-334250","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago","8":"tag-chicago","9":"tag-crime-and-public-safety","10":"tag-il","11":"tag-illinois","12":"tag-immigration","13":"tag-keywee","14":"tag-latest-headlines","15":"tag-news","16":"tag-politics"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115441541424733910","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=334250"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334250\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/334251"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=334250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=334250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=334250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}