Young Bolingbrook Residents Protest ICE Amid Local Raids

By Dominic Guanzon

Sunday, 2/2/25

This story was covered on The Poor Proles’ Almanac podcast.

BOLINGBROOK — About 50 protesters, mostly young people from around the Bolingbrook area, gathered in front of Bolingbrook Highschool on Sunday afternoon. They’re out in a show of community strength after ICE recently heightened its operations and made at least 100 arrests throughout Chicagoland this past week. I spoke to an organizer who a part of Bolingbrook Protest (Edit: Now defunct as of 4/24):

“[ICE is] targeting warehouses…‘Oh they’re just supporting criminals!’ But that’s very on the contrary…they’re also deporting a lot of families in very unjust ways.”

The protest coincides with at least one other protest in Joliet, and more in the past week throughout the Chicagoland area.

Two days ago, Southwest Suburban Immigrant Project investigated ICE activity at warehouses in the southwest suburbs. They wrote in their post:

“We were able to confirm that ICE visited several warehouses but only 1 arrest took place at the RJW warehouse in Lockport, while other warehouses denied them entry. Thank you to the community members who reported the activity. We can protect each other! Please remember that you have rights in the workplace and that if you see anything, you can call the hotline directly at 1-855-435-7693”

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