There’s no question that Trump’s reckless ICE raids in cities across the U.S.— most recently in Chicago, where more than 3,000 people have been arrested—are meant to create a climate of fear among law-abiding immigrants and citizens living in liberal strongholds. No matter what your stance on immigration might be, I think it’s pretty fair to say that randomly snatching people who are going about their everyday lives sounds like the building plot of a dystopian horror film.
Wednesday morning, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D) had to make a heartbreaking plea via a letter to the Department of Homeland Security: to pause immigration raids in Chicago for Halloween weekend long enough to allow children to celebrate the holiday without fear.
The letter was sent to U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, acting Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Todd M. Lyons, and Commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection Rodney S. Scott, per NBC. Specifically, it asks for a pause in ICE operations from Friday, Oct. 31 until Sunday, Nov. 2, “in and around homes, schools, hospitals, parks, houses of worship, and other community gatherings where Halloween celebrations are taking place.”
The communication feels necessary, given the current atmosphere in Chicago and other cities where innocent civilians are experiencing the violence involved in ICE’s pursuits. This past weekend, federal agents in gas masks dropped tear gas on a neighborhood where a children’s Halloween parade was underway, forcing the organizers to cancel the celebrations, per ABC. “Even in these difficult times, they should be able to trust that they are safe — if only for one weekend,” Pritzker wrote in his letter.
Unfortunately, it appears that business — and the brutality that often ensues alongside it — will proceed as usual, since the request was denied by Noem.
It’s become overwhelmingly evident that Trump’s raids are traumatizing the children who are simply existing in our communities. And as for the purported criminals they’re arresting to justify this trauma? Sixty-five percent of the people arrested by ICE so far this year have no criminal records, per the Cato Institute, and more than 93% have never been convicted of a violent offense.
Even the language the government is using to justify the Chicago raids, which is being dubbed “Operation Midway Blitz,” sounds straight out of a World War II history textbook. All of this is by design, a part of the larger Trump narrative that the U.S. is being invaded from within.
If the Trump administration has little regard for people’s lives, not caring about the well-being of children is a whole new level of demonic aura. But as disheartening as the scenes of ICE raids in Chicago have been, we’ve also seen evidence of people standing together and fighting back, including clips of dozens of people filming officers as they arrest civilians to make sure this abysmal time in history is recorded for all to see.
Frankly, we can’t believe we’re in the “children deserve to celebrate a holiday without fearing for their lives” part of the second Trump term, yet here we are.