Feds plan Chicago deployment as Trump warns other Dem-led cities
WASHINGTON — Homeland Security officials said Monday that they are preparing to deploy federal agents to Chicago, and President Donald Trump threatened to send U.S. law enforcement personnel to other Democratic-led cities experiencing spates of crime as he defended his use of force in Portland, where agents have clashed nightly with protesters and made arrests from unmarked cars.
Calling the unrest in Portland “worse than Afghanistan,” Trump’s rhetoric escalated tensions with Democratic mayors and governors who have criticized the presence of federal agents on U.S. streets, telling reporters at the White House that he would send forces into jurisdictions with or without the cooperation of their elected leaders.
“We’re looking at Chicago, too. We’re looking at New York,” he said. “All run by very liberal Democrats. All run, really, by the radical left.”
Three Department of Homeland Security officials said Monday the agency has been making preparations to deploy agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to Chicago, but the officials said operational details of the plan are not yet finalized.
The officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the plans, said the agents, who are part of ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations division, would not engage in immigration enforcement operations, and probably would assist with intelligence-gathering and targeting of the drug-trafficking groups and gangs driving the violence.
Trump has mentioned New York and Philadelphia as two other cities where his administration is looking to send in federal agents, but two DHS officials said Chicago is the only city where their plans have advanced.
DHS officials involved in the preparations also said the federal agents would be directed by the Department of Justice, and their assignment in Chicago would be very different from the standoff between federal forces and protesters in Portland, despite the president’s attempts to link the two.
Portland and Seattle are the only cities that have seen sustained clashes between militant protesters and authorities.