The Department of Homeland Security announced Monday it is launching “Operation Midway Blitz,” which it described as a targeted effort to increase federal immigration enforcement operations in Chicago.
“This ICE operation will target the 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,” DHS wrote on X.
The move comes hours after the Supreme Court removed a temporary restraining order, allowing Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in the Los Angeles area to conduct raids based solely on ethnicity or the fact that people may be speaking in Spanish.
DHS’ announcement Monday was accompanied by a four-minute video of Michelle and Joe Abraham, the parents of 20-year-old Katie Abraham, who was killed in a January hit-and-run accident allegedly caused by a Mexican immigrant.
“Why do these people who break these laws who are not U.S. citizens deserve due process?” Michelle Abraham says in the video. “Because again, Katie got nothing; she got death.”
In a press release announcing the department’s plans, DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin pointed to sanctuary city policies as endangering American citizens. The release also included the names of a dozen other incidents of undocumented immigrants being charged with vehicular homicides.
“These two young women—college students with their entire lives ahead of them—were killed by an illegal alien who should have NEVER been in our country. This tragedy was senseless and completely preventable,” McLaughlin said in the release.
The Trump administration turned its efforts to Chicago last week after the president declared that federal authorities — and potentially National Guard troops — would be going in at an unknown future date.
Over the weekend, Trump also posted to Truth Social an AI-generated image of himself as Robert Duvall in the iconic napalm scene from the 1979 film “Apocalypse Now.” Instead of the Vietnamese jungle, Trump’s image portrayed a burning Chicago skyline with the caption, “‘I love the smell of deportations in the morning.’”
“Chicago is about to find out why it’s called the Department of WAR,” he added.
The President of the United States is threatening to go to war with an American city.
— Governor JB Pritzker (@GovPritzker) September 6, 2025
This is not a joke. This is not normal.
Donald Trump isn't a strongman, he's a scared man. Illinois won’t be intimidated by a wannabe dictator. pic.twitter.com/f87Zek7Cqb
In a statement to NOTUS, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson said despite Trump’s posts to social media, city officials “received no notice of any enhanced immigration action by the Trump administration.”
“We are concerned about potential militarized immigration enforcement without due process because of ICE’s track record of detaining and deporting American citizens and violating the human rights of hundreds of detainees,” Johnson said in the statement. “We remain opposed to militarized immigration enforcement that runs afoul of the Constitution in our city.”
On Friday, an internal memo obtained by CBS revealed DHS requested Chicago’s Great Lakes Naval Station be used as a staging area for future enforcement efforts. Monday afternoon, after DHS’ announcement, crowds formed outside the base in protest.
In a press conference in southwest Chicago, the grassroots group Arab American Action Network said ICE began Operation Midway Blitz earlier Monday morning with raids targeted around Chicago Midway International Airport.