Immigration enforcement surge timed to suppress census, says congressman

State’s Attorney Foxx adds that intimidation undermines legal system

Backed by Pastor Emma Lozano and Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, U.S. Rep. Jesus “Chuy” Garcia speaks out against President Trump’s “toxic rhetoric.” (One Illinois/Ted Cox)

Backed by Pastor Emma Lozano and Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, U.S. Rep. Jesus “Chuy” Garcia speaks out against President Trump’s “toxic rhetoric.” (One Illinois/Ted Cox)

By Ted Cox

CHICAGO — A Chicago congressman charged Tuesday that a reported surge in the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement has been deliberately timed to suppress the 2020 U.S. Census and this year’s elections.

U.S. Rep. Jesus “Chuy” Garcia cited a report last week in The New York Times stating that about 100 U.S. Customs and Border Protection tactical officers are being deployed to so-called sanctuary cities to aid Immigration and Customs Enforcement forces. Chicago and New York City were among those being targeted, according to the report, along with San Francisco, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Houston, Boston, New Orleans, Detroit, and Newark, N.J.

“This announcement is about an anti-census, anti-immigrant, and anti-democracy campaign,” Garcia said in a news conference held at the National Museum of Mexican Art in Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood. “We’ve seen this script before many times.”

Garcia pointed to how the surge in immigration enforcement was set to take place from February into May, the time U.S. Census officials will be knocking on doors to confirm head counts and other information. At the same time, undocumented immigrants and the families and friends who house them are being warned not to open their doors to immigration agents unless they have a warrant. “You see the correlation,” Garcia said. “It’s crass politics, and it seeks to become crass intimidation.

“Just in time for the census, we get this announcement,” Garcia added. “The timing is no accident. The attempted intimidation has a clear purpose. It is to intimidate our neighbors in Latino, African-American, Asian-American communities in particular, not to open their doors.

“Trump succeeds if we do that,” Garcia stated. “Trump wants us to be undercounted in our communities so that we would lose federal resources and services that are vital to our communities and weaken our political power.”

Garcia also charged, “Trump is hoping his intimidation will keep our folks from registering to vote. But we’re going to prove him wrong.”

Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx added that the immigration offensive not only threatens to undermine the 2020 Census, but it is already having a chilling effect on the legal system, as immigrants concerned about being rounded up by ICE agents have been reluctant to file charges on crimes or go to court out of fear that they could be detained.

“It is difficult to delineate who is ICE and who is law enforcement, and that is purposeful. That is intentional,” Foxx said. “That’s what this was designed to do, to keep people in the shadows.”

Mony Ruiz-Velasco, director of PASO, the West Suburban Action Project, and board chairman at the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, confirmed that distrust toward immigration agents was undermining the legal system. “There is no trust between the immigrant community and law enforcement,” she said, “because people don’t know who everyone is.”

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot was lobbying in Springfield Tuesday, but Garcia quoted from a statement she issued over the weekend, saying, “If anyone thinks that they can come to this city and terrorize our residents into the shadows, they’re wrong. … Our strength is standing together.”

“Chicago will not stand for this,” said Nubia Wilman, director of the Mayor’s Office for New Americans. “Instilling fear in our neighbors and friends and promoting hatred on a national scale will not be tolerated.

“On behalf of the mayor and the entire city of Chicago, I want you to know that we stand with you and will always fight to keep you safe,” she added. “Chicago is a proud welcoming city, and no fearmongering from the Trump administration will change that.”

Wilman counseled Chicagoans to know their rights and to demand to see a warrant before granting entry to any officers, and she emphasized that the Chicago Police Department has been formally ordered not to collaborate with immigration agents.

“Chicago will not stand on the sidelines as valued members of our community are sacred into the shadows,” she added.

Foxx echoed that, saying, “The State’s Attorney’s Office does not cooperate or engage with ICE.”

Ruiz-Velasco said resistance to the enforcement surge was statewide, not just in Chicago. “Illinois is the most welcoming state,” she said. “Our communities have been targeted across the state and across the country.”

Calling out President Trump’s “toxic rhetoric” on immigration, dating back to 2015 when as a candidate Trump accused Mexican immigrants of being “rapists,” Garcia said, “This is nothing but a campaign of fear. It’s a campaign about keeping communities marginalized.

“It’s also about keeping us politically weak in our country,” he added. “We reject those proposals on their face.”

Garcia has previously charged that ICE was “declaring war on our neighborhoods” by training agents in tactics in settings designed to look like Chicago neighborhoods.

“We’re in this together,” Foxx said. “Public and community safety requires that we look after our neighbors, no matter their origins, no matter how they got here. We must reject the racism and xenophobia that comes from this administration and its hand-picked attorney general, who has made it clear and unequivocal and unapologetic that he has no love for these communities.”

Garcia insisted the controversy would not get in the way of an accurate census count. “We are going to make sure we are counted and those resources come to our communities,” he said. “We are going to register to vote. We are going to know our rights. We are going to resist the fearmongering.”

Ted Cox