Since President Donald Trump returned to the White House in January, federal immigration authorities have intensified their mass deportation efforts, leading to increased requests for arrest records from the Chicago Police Department.
Records obtained by the Chicago Sun-Times reveal that the police department has consistently complied with these requests, supplying documents that include personal information such as names, addresses, and countries of origin of immigrants targeted by agencies like the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and Customs and Border Protection (CBP).
This trend of fulfilling public records requests continued during former President Joe Biden’s administration, which ended on January 20, coinciding with Trump’s return to a stance advocating for a stringent overhaul of immigration policy.
The recent aggressive immigration enforcement actions have sparked protests in Chicago and other cities, including Los Angeles.
In Los Angeles, the deployment of the National Guard and Marines aimed to safeguard federal property and mitigate volatile demonstrations.
In Chicago, resistance to ICE’s operations became evident when a crowd gathered outside an ICE check-in office, where they attempted to obstruct federal agents from detaining immigrants.
This chaos drew the attention of the Chicago police, who found themselves in a confrontation with both demonstrators and members of the City Council.
City officials and advocates for immigration rights have called for investigations into whether the police department has violated state law and city ordinances that restrict cooperation with federal immigration actions.
The responses from the police department, as shown by the records disclosed to ICE, demonstrate the limitations even within a city that has declared itself a sanctuary.
Chicago’s police officers have provided information through arrest reports that can be useful for immigration enforcement, indicating a complex relationship between local law enforcement and federal agencies.
Between November 2022 and late March 2023, federal agencies, including DHS, ICE, and CBP, acquired arrest records for at least a dozen individuals under Illinois’ Freedom of Information Act.
The individuals varied in their legal circumstances; some had no convictions while others possessed extensive arrest histories with serious charges.
Eduardo Drubi, one individual who was recently detained, was reported as having been deported back to Chile., despite lacking any criminal convictions in Cook County, according to his attorney Richard L. Fenbert, who took on Drubi’s case on April 3, after he had already been apprehended by ICE.
Records indicate that the Chicago police transmitted Drubi’s arrest documents to ICE on March 28.
In a notable incident from February 2024, an ICE attorney requested records relating to a “noncitizen” prior to a court hearing, seeking documents concerning arrests dating back to the mid-1990s.
The Chicago police department responded that it could not locate any relevant records.
In Illinois, government agencies are typically obliged to respond to public records requests within five business days, with the option for a five-day extension.
However, many deadlines can be disregarded, and unresponsive agencies may face lawsuits compelling them to fulfill records requests via the Illinois attorney general’s office.
On several occasions, the Chicago Police Department provided rapid responses to at least three requests from ICE and CBP, and another request from DHS received a reply within three days.
Despite some records being handed over, there were instances where records requested from ICE and CBP were not provided.
Spokespeople for ICE and DHS did not respond to inquiries for comment, and a CBP representative declined to comment on the situation.
Regarding its cooperation with federal agencies, a police department spokesperson emphasized a previous statement made after the confrontations at the ice check-in office, asserting that officers do not engage in immigration enforcement.
The mayor’s office did not reply to requests for comment, although Mayor Brandon Johnson criticized ICE for seeking personal information from the city clerk’s office about applicants for a city-issued identification card favored by noncitizens.
Johnson remarked that such practices were detrimental and unethical.
Mary Richardson-Lowry, serving as the corporation counsel, stated that the city did not comply with ICE’s request for ID records due to the risk of exposing sensitive information concerning vulnerable populations, including domestic violence victims.
She emphasized that the request from ICE was categorized as an “administrative warrant” that lacked a judge’s signature.
Richardson-Lowry expressed a willingness to respond appropriately should ICE pursue a court order for the documentation.
The City Council’s Committee on Immigrant and Refugee Rights is set to conduct a hearing on the chaotic events surrounding immigration arrests at the ICE office on June 4.
A letter from members of the Latino Caucus outlined their intention to investigate potential ICE misconduct and assess the Chicago Police Department’s involvement during the ICE operations.
Ald. Andre Vasquez (40th) leads the committee and Latino Caucus; he articulated the need for the hearing to examine the extent of the police cooperations and the information shared with federal agencies.
Ald. Byron Sigcho-Lopez (25th), who represents areas with large Latino populations such as Pilsen and Little Village, underscored the necessity for lawmakers to address gaps in sanctuary laws to better secure protections for immigrants facing deportation.
Reports have suggested that officers in the Near West District had been instructed to alert DHS about the arrests of individuals associated with tattoos or clothing linked to the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, a focus of Trump’s hardline immigration policies.
Police Superintendent Larry Snelling stated that an investigation was initiated following the allegations of directives presented in an October 2023 briefing.
Sigcho-Lopez now seeks inquiries into any potential breaches of protocol, voicing concern that sharing police records with federal agencies involved in deportations may have serious consequences for the individuals affected.
Chicago has identified itself as a sanctuary city since 1985, with the City Council reinforcing this declaration under Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s “Welcoming City” ordinance in 2012.
This ordinance generally prevents the police from engaging in civil immigration enforcement or probing into individuals’ citizenship statuses.
The Illinois TRUST Act, enacted in 2017 by former Governor Bruce Rauner, fortified analogous protections on a state level.
In February, the Trump administration filed a lawsuit against the city of Chicago, the state of Illinois, and Cook County, asserting that their policies limiting local cooperation in deportations have worsened issues at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Brandon Lee, a spokesperson for the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, affirmed that advocates are working to challenge this lawsuit while aiming to strengthen the TRUST Act in the General Assembly.
The coalition has urged Attorney General Kwame Raoul to investigate the police department’s actions at the ICE check-in office.
However, Raoul stated that his team does not find sufficient grounds to initiate a formal investigation and supports the assertion that the Chicago Police Department is well-equipped to manage protests peacefully, contrary to federal troop deployments.
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