Some screenshots from itp_chicago IG. You can see how federal agents stake their presence around some of these communities in intersections in the middle of traffic and sidewalks in front of businesses. This feels very particular to the SW Side with Little Village being a prime target for this.

@katieprout.bsky.social wrote this vitally important piece this week about ICE attacks on the unhoused in Chicago for @chicagoreader.com.

A Know Your Rights breakdown specific to unhoused people is available on our website! 1. Spanish: chicagoreader.com/news/conozca... 2. English chicagoreader.com/news/know-yo...

At least 26 unhoused Chicagoans have been kidnapped by federal agents since September, including a man I'm calling Theo, a quiet day laborer who lived near Gompers Park. Two other people were also recently taken from this community. chicagoreader.com/news/ice-bor...

"unhoused people are particularly vulnerable to their violence: heavily criminalized, culturally scapegoated, and with fewer smartphones and eyes to notice or bear witness to their abductions." important reporting by @katieprout.bsky.social

I really want to highlight this. In August, Chief Homelessness Officer Soto said “The city believes firmly that being unhoused is not a crime, so we will not be assisting with any sort of arrest or enforcement toward the unhoused community for being unhoused." BUT--

the @chicagoreader.com also put together know your rights resources for unhoused folks interacting with federal agents in chicago, based on the excellent information compiled by @chicagohomeless.bsky.social. they're available in spanish: chicagoreader.com/news/conozca... and english:

it's impossible to see these attacks on unhoused neighbors as separate from chicago's long history of criminalizing homelessness. on october 29, agents abducted an unhoused man from lawrence/pulaski—blocks away from gompers park, where city crews and police forced out residents earlier this year.

@katieprout.bsky.social asked mayor brandon johnson's office and chicago's chief homelessness officer, sendy soto, if they knew how many unhoused people have been abducted across the city and whether the presence of federal agents has impacted future plans for park evictions. neither responded.

new: at least 26 unhoused chicagoans have been abducted since the start of "operation midway blitz." the full scope of people disappeared is likely much larger but is obscured by heavy criminalization, social stigma, and fewer eyes and phones around to bear witness. via @katieprout.bsky.social

The only pledge of allegiance I acknowledge

NOT CRYING

Bumping this devastating, essential reporting by @dmbrown-tboy.bsky.social again. Rideshare workers, already treated terribly by the union-busting corps they work for, are being kidnapped from O'Hare as city-hired security guards watch.

Ah, I was hoping for a city backed rapid response program. It is know your rights resources. Good but I don't even think the signs they're offering are legally meaningful. The daycare had one yesterday, pretty sure.

Interesting!

Here's a photo of the old Chicago streetcar rails under Western Ave. that have been uncovered by construction. I took this from the Brown Line platform.

to underscore this point: uber requires drivers to have a social security number. lyft allows drivers to use a temporary identification number provided they’ve had their license for at least a year. these folks all have legal authorization to work here.

They counted on making Chicago mad and provoking violence but what they did instead was viscerally disgust any human with even the slightest sense of morality and it’s not gonna go the way they want

Hell is not hot enough. If you’re not yet tapped into your local mutual aid or rapid response group, today is as good a day as any to plug in.

Another beauty, taken that same day. West Ridge, I was entirely unfamiliar with your rather enchanting game. Architect: George Maher, 1911

“Step back or I’m going to shoot you” An Evanston resident is alleging a DHS agent said that to him while pointing his gun, which attorneys say violates the TRO issued by Judge Sara Ellis More here: evanstonnow.com/feds-accused...

Really sucks that they wasted a heart on that guy

All these Edmund Fitzgerald memes . . . my culture is not your costume

I want to believe

I appreciate both @katieprout.bsky.social’s write-up and @brian-goldstone.bsky.social’sshout out to @chicagohomeless.bsky.social‘s workin his recent visit to Chicago to discuss his excellent book “There is No Place for Us.” We can’t solve homelessness without first understanding its true scope.

Happy Godzilla Day! Reupping my deep dive from a few years back on the largest Godzilla convention on earth (it's in Rosemont!) chicagoreader.com/arts-culture...

Reverend David Black has a Bible open and is preaching to the police now, inviting them to join him in standing with the persecuted inside the detention center. "Which side do you think Jesus wanted his followers to be on?"

While this continues, people are shouting out allegations about overcrowding and medical emergencies inside the detention center from a lawsuit just filed yesterday. Crowd has dwindled considerably. ~200 cops and feds here amassed vs ~50 protesters.

Curfew in effect now. First push back.

a plainclothes federal agent walked into a brighton park barber shop pretending to be a customer this morning. the agent came back half an hour later with two other feds and abducted someone, then threatened to arrest anyone else who stepped in.

I especially appreciate the inclusion of this part, which I feel really deeply right now: "It's not about realism versus imagination. It's about competing versions of an imagined future, an imagined present."

I had such a meaningful night in Chicago with Eve Ewing at the National Public Housing Museum, and I'm grateful to @katieprout.bsky.social for this piece on the event and THERE IS NO PLACE FOR US—about housing, state violence, political imagination, and refusing the myth of dispassionate journalism.

it was never even a question in my mind that David Byrne would be on the right side of this shit

For the night crowd

Current* conditions near Grand Haven, MI:

Cynthia learned she was HIV positive in 1985 and was diagnosed with AIDS in 1987. She died on October 26, 1989. Did you know Cynthia? Contact the LA&M to help preserve her memory in the community archive. 🖤

Cynthia Slater was a professional dominant, educator, and HIV/AIDS and safer sex activist. Slater co-founded the Society of Janus and worked with the San Francisco Sex Information hotline. She co-founded the first mixed gender parties at The Catacombs.

This is a good sign

LOT of cars following these guys. Tons of horns and whistles.

Border patrol in 3 pm traffic. 19th and Ashland.

It’s #SpookySeason! 👻🕸️ The Internet Archive is serving frights all week. Today’s treat: a 1928 Saturday Evening Post cover by Frederic Stanley of a woman carving a pumpkin 🎃 97 years later & still haunting! 🖤 More ⤵️ archive.org/details/@ste... 🧵

SNAP isn't about "people who don't work." It's about people who don't get paid enough to live. Of the 40 or so million people who rely on food stamps: * Two-thirds are children, seniors, or disabled * Most working-age adults who receive SNAP are employed—but in jobs that pay poverty wages

rather than a success, i see this as an indictment of the illinois state police’s actions. it’s yet more evidence that cops (in general and at broadview) escalate protests through needless violence.

jesus christ man, we can’t ever get used to this and normalize it.

jaywalking isn’t real just cross that street

ice and border patrol and continuing their terror campaign across chicagoland this morning. masked agents are active and making abductions in waukegan, des planes, and along the northwest side of the city. abductions from windy city produce and yet more tear gas near schurz high school.

chicago is under a federally funded terrorist attack and we are just supposed to ignore it, keep walking, go to work & shut up

it’s beyond comprehension that scenes like this have become routine in chicago. masked soldiers are carelessly lobbing chemical weapons—that are banned from use during warfare—on random residential streets. this is the third time feds have tear-gassed residents in chicago *this week!*

It's great that other outlets are now also reporting on local companies who've accepted millions of dollars to support ICE, but @juggaloreporter.bsky.social broke the DHS - United Tactical Systems relationship a month ago. You can read it here: chicagoreader.com/news/pepperb...