17 arrested as Chicago protesters march against Donald Trump's immigration crackdown

Chicago Tribune

a day ago

A massive demonstration by thousands who marched through Chicago's Loop in protest of President Donald Trump's immigration crackdown briefly snarled Tuesday evening traffic and resulted in several confrontations between protesters and police as crowds surged into downtown streets and DuSable Lake Shore Drive.
Chicago police arrested 17 people over the course of the hours-long protest, which began at Federal Plaza and wound as far north as West Grand Avenue in the River North neighborhood, walking among stopped cars and buses on several main arteries, including DuSable Lake Shore Drive. Multiple city vehicles could be seen with anti-CPD, anti-ICE graffiti.
Four of the people arrested were charged with felonies ranging from aggravated battery to a police officer and criminal damage to government property, police said. They were all set to appear in court on Wednesday.
Of the others arrested, 10 people were charged with misdemeanors, including battery, reckless conduct, criminal defacement and resisting arrest, police said. One person was cited for possessing a paint marker with the intention of using it for graffiti and charges were still pending against two more people, police said.
Police helicopters hovered as marchers wove between vehicles. Police detained two people around 6:15 p.m. at South State and East Monroe streets as protesters yelled in the intersection.
As officers detained people and cars waited in traffic, a woman who was told to drive west on Monroe had a brief, shouted exchange with an officer. After making a noise of apparent frustration, she drove across the intersection down a street filled with marchers. People screamed and scattered. A few moments later, an officer knelt in front of a woman seated on the sidewalk, holding a little girl in her lap, shaking her head.
Although no one appeared to be injured immediately afterward, police confirmed Wednesday morning that a 66-year-old woman who had been standing in the street had broken her arm. She was taken to Northwestern Hospital for treatment and no one was in custody as of 1 p.m. Wednesday, police said.
Around 7 p.m. on Tuesday, as the protest passed the Art Institute of Chicago, four people in black could be seen spray-painting anti-ICE slogans on the building's walls.
As the march made its way up North Clark Street, many of the people dining outside raised their phones to capture some of the chants and signs, some of which read 'We the people have had enough' and 'No human being is illegal.' Many in restaurant staff uniforms held their phones aloft and pumped their fists to marchers going by.
After a brief stop in Daley Plaza, the march appeared to split into two groups. One group briefly stood off with CPD at the intersection of North State and West Washington Streets, chanting 'who do you serve? Who do you protect?' As more officers ringed the intersection with helmets and batons. It was not immediately clear whether people were detained following that confrontation.
If you're arrested by ICE in Illinois, what happens next? Legal experts explain the process.Other short confrontations erupted back at Federal Plaza, where a squad car sat covered in anti-ICE graffiti, and at the intersection of South Michigan Avenue and East Jackson Boulevard just before 9 p.m.
The march had been moving south down Michigan Avenue when an officer appeared to confront a protester. The protester, dressed in all black, hit the ground and a supervisor pulled the officer back. Other officers quickly surrounded the protester as he crawled toward the traffic median.
Protests that sprang up in Los Angeles over immigration enforcement raids and prompted President Donald Trump to mobilize National Guard troops and the Marines have begun to spread across the country, with more planned into the weekend.
From Seattle to Austin and Washington, D.C., marchers have chanted slogans, carried signs against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency and snarled traffic through downtown avenues and outside federal offices. While many were peaceful, some have resulted in clashes with law enforcement as officers made arrests and used chemical irritants to disperse crowds.
In Illinois, Gov. JB Pritzker has been a loud opponent of Trump's enforcement campaign. And Chicago has long been a 'sanctuary city' that prohibits its law enforcement from inquiring about residents' immigration status or cooperating with federal immigration officials.
Trump's 'border czar' Tom Homan pledged just before the new administration took office that sanctuary cities such as Chicago would be epicenters for Trump's promised crackdown on immigrants in the country without legal permission. But the city hasn't seen major unrest related to the raids so far, besides a June 4 clash between immigration authorities and advocates and some City Council members outside an ICE field office in the South Loop.
Earlier on Tuesday afternoon, about 40 people gathered with signs and drums outside a building where immigration court takes place, located at 55 E. Monroe St.
'ICE belongs in our coffee, not in our communities,' a sign read.
The group expanded to about 200 protesters, and briefly blocked traffic outside the office before marching down to a second ICE outpost, at Ida B. Wells Drive and South Clark Street, but found the intersection taped off by the Police Department. They turned to march north and east through the Loop, carrying Mexican and Palestinian flags.
'No fear, no hate, no ICE in our state,' they chanted.
Benjamin Milford commuted to the city from Wheaton to voice his opposition to deportations of families, particularly children of unauthorized immigrants who were U.S. citizens and in need of medical care. About 3:30 p.m., he was sitting on the sidewalk outside immigration court adjusting the rollerblades he'd worn to give him easier movement around the march.
'With ICE raids happening every day across the country, it needs to end,' said Milford, 30. 'I hope this sends a message to Trump and his administration that we won't put up with this in Chicago or across the country.'
Then he got back on his feet and skated off into the chanting crowd.