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GARE Conversation: Not on Our Streets: Local Responses to Federal Militarization 

4 days ago

Session Description:
As we continue to see the federal government target immigrant communities across the country, committing rampant human and civil rights abuses against residents regardless of citizenship or documentation status - often on the basis of race and ethnicity, it’s more important than ever to develop alignment in how we work together within local government and across communities to protect people from these indefensible attacks. Please join us as we bring together community and local government leaders from the greater Chicago area to discuss what a collective and collaborative response could look like, what actions we can take now as we build towards shared strategy, and what obstacles need to be overcome as we press forward on this issue.


Objectives: 

  • Understand the scope of the federal attacks on local communities and the rhetoric used to legitimize these attacks

  • Gain insight into the responses to these attacks from local elected officials, government practitioners, and community leaders

  • Discuss opportunities for aligning strategies that protect immigrant communities - and all of our communities - from federal crackdowns

 
Session Leads:

  • Moderator:

    • jaboa lake (she/her), Senior Director of Impact Evaluation, Learning, and Research, Race Forward

      • jaboa lake is a sister, auntie, organizer, and liberation movement researcher. Focused on anti-oppressive methods, jaboa has worked with nonprofits, grassroots organizations, city and county governments, labor unions, school districts, and academic research centers to provide research guidance and support. jaboa’s research and analyses have been featured in NPR, Truthout, Common Dreams, Essence, USA Today, Street Roots, state and federal supreme court briefs, academic research journals, among others. You can find jaboa outside somewhere, learning a new craft, and at the next rally.

  • Panelists:

    • Amairani Jarvis (she/her/ella), Community Organizer, Centro de Información / Elgin Area Immigrant Alliance

      • Amairani Jarvis is a Community Organizer with Centro de Información dedicated to uplifting immigrant communities through lived experience and action. Born in Cd. Acuña, Mexico and raised in the United States, she brings deep empathy to her work. With 8 years of experience as a paralegal and nonprofit advocate, Amairani expanded access to immigration services, launched free citizenship classes, and empowered families to navigate complex systems. Today she organizes with the Elgin Area Immigrant Alliance, mobilizing volunteers, sharing rights education, and strengthening collective power while centering dignity, safety, and leadership.
    • Antonio Gutierrez (they/them), Strategic Coordinator and Co-Founder, Organized Communities Against Deportations
      • Antonio Gutierrez, pronouns they/them, is an undocumented anti-displacement community organizer who has lived in Chicago for over 25 years. Gutierrez is one of the co-founders and current Strategic Coordinator for Organized Communities Against Deportations (OCAD). Gutierrez has organized direct actions, community forums, and national convenings. Gutierrez has over 12 years of non-profit administration & development experience, a degree in Architecture from Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) and is also a co-founder of the Albany Park Defense Network, and the Autonomous Tenants Union.

    • Beatriz Ponce de Leon (she/her), Deputy Mayor of Immigrant, Migrant and Refugee Rights (IMRR), Chicago IL

      • Beatriz Ponce de León serves as the inaugural Deputy Mayor for Immigrant, Migrant, and Refugee Rights for Chicago, where she leads efforts to uphold immigrant rights and advance inclusion, belonging, and opportunity for immigrant and refugee communities. Throughout her career, Beatriz has built coalitions and partnerships to create opportunities and resources that improve quality of life for communities often left behind. The daughter of Mexican immigrants, a Yale graduate and a lifelong Chicagoan, Beatriz is committed to leading with love and fighting for the common good. 

    • Diana Alfaro (she/her/ella), Councilmember, Elgin IL

      • Diana is a bilingual (English/Spanish) leader dedicated to empowering underserved communities through equity-centered initiatives that dismantle systemic barriers to business growth and development. With over 10 years in community outreach, a decade in federal regulatory compliance and 6+ years advancing equity in state government, she is a results-driven professional with a proven record of meaningful impact. Born and raised in Elgin, IL, Diana's commitment to her community runs deep - a dedication recognized in April 2025 when she was elected to serve on Elgin's City Council.


Recording Date:
Thursday, March 5, 2026
12:00-1:30pm ET/ 11:00-12:30pm CT/ 10:00-11:30pm MT/ 9:00-10:30pm PT

 

Chicago-Area Resources: 

 

Session Reads: 


Additional Reads & Resources: 

 

Materials Shared During the Session


Session Notes

  • Amairani Jarvis, Community Organizer with Centro de Informacion and Elgin Area Immigrant Alliance

    • EAIA formed after Trump reelection

    • Now has 10 committees that all work together to organize, resource, build collaboration to ensure community has the information support they need

    • Focus on education, empowerment, protection of immigrant community

  • Diana Alfaro, Elgin City Council member (elected April 2025)

    • Elgin: 115k population, 48% Latino, majority-minority community

    • More than 1/3 of council meetings since May 2025 addressed immigration enforcement

  • Antonio Gutierrez: Strategic coordinator + co-founder, Organized Communities Against Deportations (OCAD)

    • Undocumented-led organization since 2013

    • Obama - Deputy in Chief, deported over 3 million undocumented immigrants during two terms presidency

    • OCAD born as a response to increase of enforcement 

    • Trained 36 rapid response teams across region responding to tips from community

  • Beatriz Ponce de León, deputy mayor of Immigrant, Migrant and Refugee Rights in Chicago, Illinois

    • In a new role established by Mayor Johnson when he took office

    • mayor realized two of the biggest kind of areas of growth that he wanted to focus on were immigrants and refugees, and then also community safety

    • Chicago from 2022-2024 welcomed over 57,000 migrants (mostly from Latin America) + had to build a whole resettlement infrastructure

  • Escalation of Federal Enforcement as scale of raids dramatically increased

    • January 2025: 3 daily reports to hotline

    • June peak: 17 reports in one day

    • October 18 peak: 142 reports in single day

    • Total since Trump’s inauguration: 6,000 raid incidents in Chicagoland

    • Nearly 3,000 calls for detention support/legal referrals

    • Elgin July-December: 656 reports, 204 abductions (likely underreported data)

    • Impacted Mexican immigrants but also Somalians, Haitians, Ukrainians, Venezuelans

  • Impacts:

    • Students not going to school, attendance fluctuating, kids scared to not see their parents again. Ongoing challenge for public schools to make sure everyone feels safe going and participating

    • People not going grocery shopping

    • Dip in attendance at libraries because it’s a public space

    • Attacks on immigrants + other communities

      • LGBTQ + transgender communities

      • Cutting programs for gender-based violence

      • Rules changing for SNAP - people depending on the food support will lose it

      • Change to immigration status - temporary protective status turned off for Somalians, Haitians, Ukrainians, Venezuelans without very little, very little support or notification

      • Ripple effect - people lose their work permits when they become undocumented

    • Mental health impact: surviving COVID-19 and now this

  • Chicago policies

    • Sanctuary city law: feds would hold back on money that was already promised to orgs/various depts - money for transportation, money for community safety

    • Department of Justice was suing the city of Chicago’s welcoming city ordinance 

      • Chicago won, affirming the decision to not prematurely comply

  • Times of crisis expose gaps in systems and infrastructures that are really needed to support communities - role of local community organizing in resisting mass raids and supporting community members in these emergent needs across systems?

    • knowing of rights and being empowered

    • role is not to actually interrupt a detainment from happening, but to properly document it

    • Rapid response teams - neighbors/community organizers coming together from all different sectors to document and provide services that at one point even CPD (Chicago Police Dept) wasn’t offering

  • Mutual aid funds - Elgin: money going towards rent as person abducted often the breadwinner

    • Supports families left behind not knowing what to do/how to pay for rental bills/childcare

    • People prefer not to be separated from family so they self deport - money goes to getting flight back home + close out any open tabs/dues

  • Strategies / Supports

    • Strongest strategy: educating ourselves + others on our rights

      • Even though these rights aren’t being respected - creates awareness + accountability to our govt

    • Understanding that there is no definitive way to stop abductions from happening → create new systems and collaborate w/ grassroots

    • Program to observe if ICE is present + not interact with ICE, but get kids into school safely

    • tools that governments can use in rapid response to support communities + slower tools that can be used to implement and prevent things from happening in the future?

      • Community members protecting each other

      • Buying and using whistles to alert each other of ICE presence

      • People walking kids to school who are not their own children

      • Buying groceries for one another and dropping them off

      • Picking up meds at a pharmacy for others

      • Walking with/going with people to their court hearings

      • Going with people to medical appointments

    • Citywide know your rights campaign - handing out postcards, booklets, groups on the ground + faith-based groups participated too - 8/9 languages

      • In lawsuit, feds said they were interfering with immigration enforcement because of this campaign

      • Constant lawsuits against the fed govt - adding more funding to legal budget so they have the capacity to do litigation and they have been winning

      • Groups like NIJC and ACLU + cities are suing

    • Power of executive authority - Chicago’s mayor began to issue executive orders so they did lawsuit to create ICE free zones which prevent ICE and CPP from being at city-owned parking lots 

      • No authority to arrest federal agent or fine them, but can document and put up signage and use later in courts - ongoing strategy

  • Conditions of latest executive order:

    • CPD provides immediate medical attn if someone gets injured protesting or being detained by ICE

    • Verify who fed agent in charge on ground at any incident is - get ID recorded on their body cam

    • Capture info when obvious use of excessive force + something resulting in death

  • Additional Reflections

    • Community partners/individuals all want cities to show solidarity and show that they stand w/community against ICE w/ understanding that it’s not going to stop ICE

    • have important resolutions/ordinances translated into Spanish and additional languages - language access plan

    • “Hold me accountable” approach from elected officials

    • Accountability begins with listening to the community impacted but because those communities are scared to even go out shopping, meet communities where they are, not waiting for them to come

    • Transparent communication about limitations and possibilities

    • “Never say never” - all policies can be changed

    • Individual action insufficient, requires collective organizing

    • “When we fight, we win” even if victories take time

    • Honest timelines and upfront communication about challenges to build trust

    • Including impacted voices in decision-making processes

    • Using positions of power to amplify community solutions

    • “No one, just not one individual, one person, is going to be the savior of the situation that we're encountering, our communities. It's going to require collective actions, organizing and collective relationship building in order for us to get there.”

    • Accountability means continuing to stand with the community even when the path forward is an easy and using whatever influence you have to support solution that comes from the people impacted


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#Immigration
#DemocracyResilience
#HumanandCivilRights
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