The Counteroffensive Against Operation Midway Blitz

Early on a Friday morning in September, before most people had eaten breakfast, protesters outside the ICE processing plant in Broadview, Illinois, dodged projectiles from federal agents. Around 7 o’clock amBorder Patrol agents would throw protesters to the ground and cover the area, including homes and businesses, with tear gas. By Saturday afternoon, more protesters showed up and federal authorities outside the facility increased the show of force accordingly.

During the two months that U.S. Border Protection Chief Patrol Agent Gregory Bovino led Operation Midway Blitz in and around Chicago, the village of Broadview, located a dozen miles west of the city, became a testing ground, not only for how the federal government could terrorize local communities, but also for how people would fight back.

Facebook groups sprung up at the start of Bovino’s reign of terror to track the movements of agents on the ground. But Laura Loomer, a far-right provocateur and close ally of President Donald Trump, complained, and Facebook’s parent company Meta — one of several media empires now eager to do Trump’s bidding — began shutting down some.

But a host of new handy tips followed. In Chicago’s Hispanic neighborhoods, restaurants began locking their doors against possible immigration raids, letting customers in individually. Signal cats and Facebook groups enable rapid distribution of 3D-printed whistles to alert residents to the presence of Bovino troops nearby. This innovation quickly spread throughout the Chicago metropolitan area; the sight and sound of mobilized whistleblower activists has become a common part of life on the streets this fall. Local authorities reminded residents to always carry their whistles, and these informal citizen squads were often the first warning of an immigration raid in many neighborhoods.

Most people refer to all immigration enforcement teams as ICE, but the most horrific actions in the Chicago area have been carried out by Border Patrol agents. While guarding ICE facilities, CBP ran the show under Bovino, working with a motley group of officials from other federal agencies, including the federal Bureau of Prisons and Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations and Suppression Operations teams.

Outside the facility, gas and pepper ball residue covered everything. When gates opened to let cars through or to let federal authorities through to carry out unprovoked attacks on protesters over social media content, the residue followed in its wake, burning eyes and throats.

On Saturday, September 27, federal agents deployed their largest show of force during the months-long siege of the facility. Almost every time DHS agents opened the door to the facility, they attacked people and arrested them. One day, as the agents were retreating, they ran over Dana Briggs, a 70-year-old Air Force veteran who was out of their way. In a typical Kafkaesque twist, DHS then attempted to indict Briggs on criminal charges of assaulting and resisting federal agents; the complaint filed against him has since been upgraded to a misdemeanor.

The conflict came to a head that day when a group of protesters locked arms and prepared to defy Bovino’s order to stop blocking the road in front of the gate. Some wore respirators and goggles; many others wore goggles and N95 masks. Almost everyone looked terrified.

As soon as the officers opened the door, they began yelling at people to move back to the end of the block and began shooting pepper balls into the crowd. A thick layer of tear gas immediately engulfed the demonstrators; officers also fired at them from well beyond the end of the block as they retreated. The demonstrators were not prepared for this all-out assault; the ski goggles and ventilated work glasses that some had donned during one-on-one confrontations with officers outside the facility were completely useless. Following the federal riot on the 27th, officers from the Cook County Sheriff and Illinois State Police began crowding out DHS officers outside the building.

DHS agents continued to fan out across Chicagoland to execute detention raids during Operation Midway Blitz. They were by far the most dominant contingent of masked feds attacking and arresting landscapers, and demanding papers from workers unloading trucks in alleys. A Border Patrol agent also shot a Hispanic woman who was a U.S. citizen in her car after ramming her with his vehicle, and bragged about his marksmanship in a series of text messages with his colleagues. She was also arrested for obstructing a federal agent with a deadly weapon, namely her car.