Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker denounced the Trump administration’s deployment of armed Border Patrol and immigration officers, some wearing masks, in Chicago and other parts of the state at a news conference Monday. He called the moves “authoritarianism” and an attack on Americans.
Bristling from weeks of what he labeled “chaos” — including a weekend of clashes between the agents and demonstrators — Pritzker condemned armed officers patrolling city streets and the Chicago River stopping and arresting people. His message to them: “Get out of Chicago. You are not helping us.”
Pritzker warned the administration may be about to escalate its operation with the addition of military troops and equipment. Moments before the news conference, the Illinois National Guard received word that the Department of Homeland Security had sent a memo to the Defense Department seeking deployment of 100 military troops to Illinois, Pritzker said.
The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The presence of federal officers in the Chicago area is part of the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigrants and cities that President Donald Trump says are plagued by crime. He has claimed Chicago is a “hellhole.”
Trump has deployed National Guard troops in Washington, D.C., Los Angeles and New York and may send about 200 to Portland, Oregon.
The enforcement in and around Chicago turned deadly this month when an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer shot and killed an immigrant who tried to flee in his car when an officer pulled him over.
The Department of Homeland Security has said the agent, who was standing by the passenger side of the vehicle, was dragged as the car was moving and injured. Pritzker and other state officials have been demanding more information and transparency about the investigation.
The immigration officers and agents have been “waging war on our people” in an attempt to cause “chaos and mayhem in the hopes to deploy military troops against Chicago and Broadview and other suburbs,” Pritzker said.
“In any other country, if federal agents fired upon journalists and protesters when unprovoked, what would we call it? If federal agents marched down busy streets harassing civilians and demanding their papers … I don’t think we’d have any trouble calling it what it is: authoritarianism,” Pritzker said, referring to the presence of troops in downtown Chicago and a recent protest where ICE officers fired pepper spray at demonstrators and a tear gas canister was placed near media trucks.
Pritzker was flanked by Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, other elected officials and representatives of faith communities, business and other parts of state and local society.
Pritzker said Trump and members of his administration are lying when they claim that the military and law enforcement deployments are improving public safety by leading to arrests of violent criminals and gang members.
Instead, Pritzker said, agents are “acting like jackbooted thugs,” targeting tamale vendors, delivery people and families.
“We have received many reports of U.S. citizens being detained for simply stepping on a public street,” he said.
On Sunday, Trump said on Truth Social that “Border Patrol will take no nonsense” in a post that included video of immigration officers confronting a crowd of protesters.
Last week, a gunman fired from a rooftop onto an ICE facility in Dallas, killing an immigrant detainee and injuring two others. Authorities said that the shooter was targeting ICE agents and that one of the bullets had a marking that said “anti ICE.”
Trump said after the Dallas shooting that ICE agents “are facing an unprecedented increase in threats [and] violence” and called on Democrats to stop rhetoric against ICE and law enforcement.
Not long after Pritzker’s news conference, Attorney General Pam Bondi said on X that she had directed agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the FBI and the U.S. Marshals Service to deploy officers and agents to ICE facilities “whenever they come under attack.”
Federal agents and protesters clashed Friday through Sunday outside the ICE facility in Broadview.
On Sept. 19, agents deployed tear gas and pepper spray against protesters trying to block ICE vehicles from driving in and out of the Broadview facility. Physical confrontations erupted as officers sought to arrest some protesters.
An NBC Chicago reporter at that protest said a tear gas canister was placed near its media trucks.
Separately, the Broadview Police Department is investigating a CBS Chicago reporter’s complaint that on Sunday a masked federal agent fired pepper balls at her from about 50 feet inside the Broadview ICE facility fence, striking her vehicle, NBC Chicago reported.
A DHS representative told the Chicago Sun-Times in a statement Monday that “No member of the media at CBS or any other outlet was ‘attacked.’” The statement also added, in part, “Secretary Noem has been clear: rioters will not stop or slow us down from removing the worst of the worst.”
Broadview Mayor Katrina Thompson told DHS in a letter obtained by NBC News that the administration’s immigration enforcement actions are beleaguering residents and first responders.
The “relentless” deployment of tear gas, pepper spray, and rubber bullets is “endangering” nearby residents and harming police and firefighters and people exercising their constitutional rights, Thompson wrote.
She also said DHS has ignored the village’s request to take down a gate it “illegally” erected on a street in front of its ICE facility, which she called an obstruction for firefighters who may need to respond to emergencies.
“You have to dismantle the fence. You have to stop putting our residents, our police officers, our firefighters, and our citizens in harm’s way,” she wrote.
The policing by Border Patrol is taking place as agents encounter significantly fewer immigrants on the southwest border.
In his remarks Monday, Pritzker sent a plea to his state’s residents: “Get out your cellphones, record and narrate what you see, put it on social media.”
He encouraged residents to “peacefully” ask for badge numbers and ID and speak up for neighbors.”
“We need to let the world know that this is happening, and we won’t stand for it,” he said.