The Trump administration plans to evacuate an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility outside Chicago that has become the site of protests over the president’s immigration crackdown in the city, according to Department of Homeland Security communications viewed by HuffPost.
ICE officials are expected to take detainees and equipment out of the facility in suburban Broadview, where demonstrators said they were tear-gassed and arrested on Friday, and move them to a different ICE location. It isn’t clear how many detainees are held in Broadview, or when operations would resume there.
The decision to abruptly relocate staff underscores the impromptu nature of ICE’s surge in cities where it may not have the necessary infrastructure in place to safely hold detainees or handle protests. Chicago is one of several Democratic strongholds where Donald Trump has promised to boost deportations and take a hard line on crime.
DHS, which includes ICE, did not immediately respond to a request for comment Sunday.
The agency has said it has arrested nearly 550 people over the past two weeks as part of the operation known as “Midway Blitz.” The arrests follow similar swells in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., with more promised in Boston and elsewhere.
