By AAMER MADHANI
WASHINGTON — Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on Sunday said that the Trump administration will soon expand immigration operations in Chicago, confirming plans for a stepped up presence of federal agents in the nation’s third-largest city as President Donald Trump continues to lash out at Illinois’ Democratic leadership.
Noem’s comments come after the DHS last week requested limited logistical support from officials at the Naval Station Great Lakes to support the agency’s anticipated operations. The military installation is about 35 miles north of Chicago.
“We’ve already had ongoing operations with ICE in Chicago… but we do intend to add more resources to those operations,” Noem said during an appearance CBS News’ ”Face the Nation.”
Noem declined to provide further details about the planned surge of federal officers. It comes after the Trump administration deployed National Guard troops to Washington, D.C., to target crime, immigration and homelessness, and two months after it sent troops to Los Angeles.
Trump lashed out against Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker in a social media posting Saturday, warning him that he must straighten out Chicago’s crime problems quickly “or we’re coming.” The Republican president has also been critical of Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson.
Johnson and Pritzker have pushed back against the expected federal mobilization, saying crime has fallen in Chicago. They are planning to sue if Trump moves forward with the plan.
Johnson has already signed an order barring the Chicago Police Department from helping federal authorities with civil immigration enforcement or any related patrols, traffic stops and checkpoints during the surge.
Chicago is home to a large immigrant population, and both the city and the state of Illinois have some of the country’s strongest rules against cooperating with federal government immigration enforcement efforts. That has often put the city and the state at odds with Trump’s administration as it tries to carry out his mass deportation agenda.
Pritzker in an interview aired Sunday on “Face the Nation” charged that Trump’s expected plans to mobilize federal forces in the city may be part of a plan to “stop the elections in 2026 or, frankly, take control of those elections.”
Noem said it was a Trump “prerogative” whether to deploy National Guard troops to Chicago as he did in Los Angeles in June in midst of immigration protests in the California city.
“I do know that LA wouldn’t be standing today if President Trump hadn’t taken action,” Noem said. “That city would have burned if left to devices of the mayor and governor of that state.”
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