Democratic state lawmakers on Wednesday condemned aggressive immigration raids that in recent weeks have resulted in violent clashes between federal agents and protestors in the Chicago region — but it remains uncertain whether their words will translate to legislative action during the fall session.

“History will judge those who are silent in this moment, and we’re going to speak up today,” House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch, D-Hillside, told reporters outside his Capitol office.  “We’re going to stand up for our democracy, and that’s our plan for today.”

Lawmakers returned to the Capitol this week for their annual fall veto session with an already extensive agenda that included reform of the state’s public transportation agencies and addressing soaring energy costs and grid reliability.

An addition to the list is addressing the immigration enforcement campaign known as “Operation Midway Blitz.” The Department of Homeland Security claims the operation has resulted in the arrest of more than 1,000 immigrants who were living in Chicago and its suburbs without legal permission over the past five weeks.

Violence has escalated as the operation has ramped up. Several protestors have been arrested over the past few weeks on charges of assaulting federal agents outside an Immigrations and Customs Enforcement processing facility in Broadview. Agents there have sprayed tear gas and nonlethal ammunition into crowds gathered outside the facility.

Other conflicts have flared up. Most recently, a car chase and crash involving federal agents resulted in a confrontation with at least 100 residents on Chicago’s Southeast Side. Agents deployed tear gas canisters to quell the clash, which resulted in the detainment of at least three people, according to the Chicago Tribune.

ADVERTISEMENT

Together for the first time in more than four months, the Democrat-controlled Illinois House — in party line votes — approved five resolutions signaling disapproval for various aspects of the Trump Administration. One decried “lawless actions” that have “denied people of all types of immigration status their rights to due process.” Another condemned politically motivated violence, “whether in the form of a mass shooting or a mass deployment of masked troops empowered to instill fear.”

Legislative response pending

Beyond expressing their opinions strongly, lawmakers thus far have taken no action this week on legislation responding to the federal immigration crackdown.

Gov. JB Pritzker told reporters after an unrelated event in Minooka on Wednesday that lawmakers “may be able to make tweaks to the law to protect people better in the state,” but cautioned that “there are limits to what a state can do.”

Still, there appears to be an effort to tee up proposals for when lawmakers return to the Capitol later this month.

One proposal being floated would prohibit civil immigration arrests inside and around courthouses under the state’s jurisdiction. It would not apply to federal facilities.

Such facilities were once generally considered off limits for immigration enforcement in a tacit understanding. But over the past year, state courts have been the site of at least 14 civil immigration apprehensions, according to the Illinois Coalition for Immigration and Refugee Rights.

On Tuesday, Cook County Chief Judge Timothy Evans issued an order barring warrantless immigration arrests of litigants and witnesses in and around the county’s courthouses. Welch said lawmakers will consider legislation taking that idea statewide.

“We want to look at language; we want to make sure lawyers are all on the same page,” Welch said. “If we can do something similar statewide, I’d love to get that done because what’s happening with these masked ICE agents in courthouses and territories around courthouses is unacceptable.”

Lawmakers are also expected to consider tweaks to the state’s TRUST Act, the 2017 law that generally prohibits state and local law enforcement from assisting federal agents with civil immigration enforcement.

The legislation filed earlier this year by state Rep. Lisa Hernandez, D-Cicero, and state Sen. Omar Aquino, D-Chicago, would expand the definition of an immigration agent to include anyone authorized to arrest and detain people for immigration enforcement, including National Guard troops. It would also clarify that campus police and school resource officers are included in law enforcement barred from cooperating with civil immigration enforcement.

Another bill, filed by state Sen. Laura Fine, D-Glenview, would require school districts to notify parents, students and staff when immigration enforcement is confirmed on campus; make health care facilities adopt policies to prevent immigration agents from entering nonpublic treatment areas without a judicial warrant, and boost privacy protections that ensure  automatic license plate reader data is not shared with federal agents.

State Sen. Celina Villanueva, D-Chicago, who is the lead sponsor on the courts measure and involved in the conversation about a broader immigration package, said she would “fight like hell with my colleagues in order to try to do whatever the hell we can in order to try to protect people.”

“The reality is, the playbook that we used to play by doesn’t exist anymore because they’re not abiding by it,” Villaneuva said. “So we’re going to get really, really creative and try to do what we can in order to stand up for people because this is not OK. This is not normal.”

Capitol News Illinois is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service that distributes state government coverage to hundreds of news outlets statewide. It is funded primarily by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.