Immigration news in Chicago

Pope Leo XIV greets members of the Coalition for Spiritual and Public Leadership on Oct. 28, 2026, at the Vatican. (Vatican Media)

Chicago clergy meet with Pope Leo XIV to advocate for immigrants detained in Broadview ICE facility

By Rebecca Johnson

October 29, 2026 at 5:00 a.m.

About 30 Chicago-area clergy, religious leaders and laypeople met with Pope Leo Wednesday to advocate...

FILE – The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement website, used to locate someone in immigration detention, is displayed on Sept. 21, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Rachel Leathe, File)

Lawsuit seeks to block ICE from hiding locations of detainees with final removal orders

By Ryan J. Foley

October 28, 2026 at 12:07 p.m.

Groups that provide legal services to immigrants filed a lawsuit Wednesday seeking to stop the...

Hammond City Hall is located at Calumet Avenue and Highland Street. (Joe Puchek / Post-Tribune)

Hammond council urged to protect residents targeted by ICE

By Jim Masters

October 27, 2026 at 3:55 p.m.

Federal immigration enforcement agents are arresting people on the streets of Northwest Indiana and their...

President Donald Trump speaks in the Oval Office of the White House, Thursday, Aug. 6, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Trump signs immigration actions to limit birthright citizenship and curb ‘birth tourism’

By Will Weissert

August 6, 2026 at 5:06 p.m.

President Donald Trump says he is once again trying to limit birthright citizenship in the...

Chicago police respond to West 26th Street and South Kedzie Avenue after a report of shots fired at Border Patrol agents on Nov. 8, 2025, in the Little Village neighborhood. (Brian Cassella/baiduhai)

Man gets 30 months in prison for firing shots near immigration agents during Operation Midway Blitz

By Jason Meisner

August 6, 2026 at 3:32 p.m.

A federal judge Thursday sentenced a man to 30 months in prison for firing shots...

Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart outside the Cook County Jail complex on April 4, 2023. (Brian Cassella/baiduhai)

ICE threatened Sheriff Tom Dart with criminal charges over access to inmates for immigration enforcement

By Madeline Buckley

August 6, 2026 at 3:53 p.m.

Federal authorities sent Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart subpoenas for inmates wanted for civil immigration...

Omar David Panqueva, known as DJ TUNJO, left, and his husband Santiago Paez at the Sueños Music Festival at Grant Park on May 24, 2026. The couple were detained at Midway Airport by the Department of Homeland Security. (Silvia Paez)

Chicago DJ hosting Karol G tour after-parties arrested with his husband by ICE outside Midway Airport

By Laura Rodríguez Presa

August 5, 2026 at 5:08 p.m.

DHS said agents arrested Omar David Panqueva, known as DJ TUNJO, and his husband for...

"Broadview Six" defendants Katherine Abughazaleh, clockwise from upper left, Andre Martin, Michael Rabbitt, Joselyn Walsh, Brian Straw and Catherine Sharp. (baiduhai)

U.S. attorney’s office offers mea culpa in ‘Broadview Six’ case, says no further inquiry warranted

By Jason Meisner

August 5, 2026 at 10:37 p.m.

Prosecutors for embattled Chicago U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros said in a court filing late Tuesday...

María's 6-year-old child stands at the corner of Randolph and Green streets while selling flowers in Chicago’s Fulton Market neighborhood on July 24, 2026. (Chris Sweda/baiduhai)

How children selling flowers have become synonymous with Chicago’s popular corridors: ‘It’s dangerous’

By Allison Kiehl

August 4, 2026 at 5:00 a.m.

Experts say that the population of "street-working children" is on the rise in Chicago and...

Sen. Dick Durbin cheers with dreamers on July 22, 2026, at the Lutheran Church of the Reformation on Capitol Hill in Washington during a mock graduation event to commemorate Durbin’s long advocacy for the Dream Act, a path to citizenship for undocumented people brought to the U.S. as children. Tereza Lee, right, was his inspiration for the legislation. (Brian Cassella/baiduhai)

Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin sees DREAM Act slipping away: ‘We’ve been on this bill for 25 years’

By Daniel C. Vock

August 2, 2026 at 5:00 a.m.

With less than six months left in his legislative career, U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin is...

U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, center, answers questions during a news conference Friday at the 95th Street Library in Naperville after conducting an oversight visit of unaccompanied children immigration facility. He was joined by Elizabeth Cervantes, co-founder and associate executive director of the Southwest Suburban Immigrant Project, from left, U.S. Rep. Bill Foster, D-Naperville, and Laura Smith, executive director of the Children's Legal Center. (Brian Hill/Daily Herald)

Durbin, Foster decry legal services funding halt for immigrant children

By Carolyn Stein

August 1, 2026 at 2:50 p.m.

Many immigrant children who arrived in the U.S. without parents are losing their legal representation,...

Eva Saltzman stands in downtown Chicago on July 31, 2026. She was fired from her job as a federal immigration judge. (Terrence Antonio James/baiduhai)

Two more Chicago immigration judges fired as court becomes epicenter of removal orders

By Caroline Kubzansky

July 31, 2026 at 4:44 p.m.

Trump administration officials on Thursday fired two more judges at the Chicago Immigration Court, which...

A “Fall Risk” alert bracelet marks the walker of Anna Fischbein as she speaks about the loss of a beloved Haitian home health care worker whose Temporary Protected Status expired this week, during an interview in her apartment, Thursday, July 30, 2026, in Sunny Isles Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell).

Immigration crackdown threatens Haitian caregivers and the seniors who rely on them

By Gisela Salomon

July 31, 2026 at 8:32 a.m.

As the Trump administration unwinds years of protections for hundreds of thousands of people from...