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There’s a letter, released to the public on Oct. 5, that’s been circulating across social media platforms. It’s written as a message of support for Chicago Ald. Jessie Fuentes (26th Ward), the 34-year-old first-term progressive who was handcuffed and temporarily detained by federal agents last week while advocating for a man receiving care inside the Humboldt Park Health emergency room after an immigration arrest.
The letter describes what the agents did to Fuentes as an “abuse of power.” Forty members of the city government signed the letter, 37 of them being her City Council peers. Mayor Brandon Johnson, City Clerk Anna Valencia and City Treasurer Melissa Conyears-Ervin also signed.
“ICE agents continue to violate civil liberties with impunity, and if we continue to allow this erosion of due process to go unchecked, we risk undermining the foundation of our democracy,” the letter reads.
A few signatures were noticeably missing: 13, to be specific. Their absence further highlights the divide among Chicago City Council on how President Donald Trump’s administration is carrying out his immigration enforcement agenda.
Ald. Gregory Mitchell (7th Ward)
Ald. Anthony Beale (9th Ward)
Ald. Marty Quinn (13th Ward)
Ald. Raymond Lopez (15th Ward)
Ald. Stephanie Coleman (16th Ward)
Ald. Matt O’Shea (19th Ward)
Ald. Silvana Tabares (23rd Ward)
Ald. Monique Scott (24th Ward)
Ald. Nicholas Sposato (38th Ward)
Ald. Anthony Napolitano (41st Ward)
Ald. Brendan Reilly (42nd Ward)
Ald. Jim Gardiner (45th Ward)
Ald. Debra Silverstein (50th Ward)
There are some commonalities among this group. Back in July, all of them were among the 27 total alderpeople who voted in favor of the controversial youth snap curfew ordinance; they tried to override a mayoral veto and failed.
Back in January, Alds. Beale, Quinn, Lopez, Tabares, Scott, Sposato, Napilitano, Reilly and Gardiner were among the 11 councilmembers who voted in favor of amending the city’s Welcoming City Ordinance to allow Chicago police to work with federal immigration officials. It was rejected by a 39-11 vote.
The TRiiBE interviewed Fuentes after the letter of support went out.
“If any of those alderpeople don’t find that incident a violation of our constitutional rights, then I don’t know what they will find a violation of our constitutional rights,” she said. “What I was doing in that moment was representing, standing up for my constituents as the local elected alderperson of the 26th Ward.”
The TRiiBE reached out to each of the 13 alders for comment but haven’t received responses yet. A staff member from Ald. Silverstein’s office told The TRiiBE that she is observing a Jewish holiday.
Since Sept. 8, federal agents have been carrying out their so-called “Operation Midway Blitz,” an immigrant removal plan targeting “criminal illegal aliens who flocked to Chicago and Illinois because they knew Governor Pritzker and his sanctuary policies would protect them and allow them to roam free on American streets,” according to a statement from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
Keep in mind, Republican governors — particularly Greg Abbott in Texas — bused asylum seekers from Latin America to Democrat-run sanctuary cities like Chicago, New York and Boston. Also, federal agents have detained U.S. citizens and immigrants of varying legal statuses during this current immigration operation. And two people have been shot by federal agents — one killed.
“They’re picking up U.S. citizens. They’re detaining children. This is not about safety. All the data in the world is showing not just in Chicago, but all over the country, they are detaining people without a criminal record,” Fuentes said. “This is not about detaining criminals. This is a war on Black and brown people.”
A phone call from hospital staff led Fuentes to Humboldt Park Health on Oct. 3. Fuentes said the presence of immigration agents scared the hospital staff and patients. There, Fuentes asked agents if they had a judicial warrant for a man’s arrest. The federal agents grew visibly agitated by her questioning; one of them violently spun her around and handcuffed her inside the hospital.
After being escorted out of the hospital by federal agents, Fuentes said she was in handcuffs for about five-to-10 minutes. U.S. Customs and Border Patrol came to the hospital after an ICE agent called for a vehicle to pick her up.
“I wanted them to articulate what were the criminal charges that they were giving me, and they couldn’t produce any,” Fuentes said, referring to the agents. “It was important for me to ensure that I was exercising my rights and asking the right questions and it was at that point that Border Patrol had demanded that the ICE agent remove the handcuffs from me.”
Fuentes added that she felt a level of anxiety because of the violence and destruction that federal agents have carried out during “Operation Midway Blitz.”
“We’re watching people’s heads get smashed up against walls. We’re watching individuals be shot at with impunity. We are watching seniors and young people being pulled out of their beds in the middle of the night and zip-tied and detained,” Fuentes added.
Fuentes explained that she doesn’t want to make assumptions based on why some of her council peers didn’t sign on to support the letter.
However, a look at some of the alderpeople’s actions toward Trump’s immigration tactics provides some insight into their positionality.
Ald. Mitchell oversees the 7th Ward, which is home to the South Shore apartment building at the center of last week’s ICE raid. Mitchell has not yet publicly issued a statement on the raid. Federal agents arrested 37 people, according to DHS, during the night raid and detained both immigrants and Black people who lived in the building. Chicago activist Jedidiah Brown called out Mitchell’s lack of a response in a recent Facebook post.
Ald. Lopez oversees the 15th Ward, which includes West Englewood, Gage Park, Back of the Yards, Brighton Park, Chicago Lawn neighborhoods. He has been a vocal critic of the city’s response to federal immigration enforcement efforts. Though Lopez is a Democrat, he’s been in rooms with Republicans and right-wing pundits who support the Trump administration.
In December, Lopez posted a picture with Trump’s so-called Border Czar Tom Homan on X: “Great meeting incoming Border Czar,” Lopez wrote. “We must enforce the laws, starting with removing those committing dangerous, violent crimes with impunity because they have asylum protections.”
In February, as a guest on the far-right podcast Real America’s Voice News, Lopez said he met with Homan and offered to give him Mayor Johnson’s address. “When I met with Tom Homan in December I offered to give him Brandon Johnson’s home address so that if he wanted to arrest him immediately and do us all that favor right on with him because I think at the end of the day you can preach your policy all you want,” Lopez said on the podcast, referring to Johnson, “but if this is a federal matter, you need to get out of the federal government’s way to allow them to execute their authority. If the Mayor of the city of Chicago thinks he can hide behind our police and not-for-profits organizations to avoid jail for his rhetoric, he’s going to be sorely mistaken.”
In a statement on Oct. 4, Lopez said he’s renewing efforts to amend the Welcoming City Ordinance “to get ICE agents out of communities and allow the Chicago Police to coordinate with them only to remove those violent criminals.”
However, legal experts, elected leaders and immigrant rights advocates previously said that type of change would violate state laws like the Illinois Trust Act and the Keep Illinois Families Together Act. Both laws make Illinois a sanctuary state and prevent local law enforcement agencies from working with ICE to enforce federal immigration laws.
Fuentes said she’s prepared to fight against Lopez’s plans to amend the ordinance. She said Lopez’s aims have nothing to do with safety or security.
“This sort of misconstrued message that this is happening because we are not in coordination with ICE is just fabricated because ICE is coming into our communities and they’re picking people up without signed judicial warrants,” Fuentes said.
