The acting deputy attorney general, Emil Bove, has traveled to Chicago to oversee one of the Trump administration’s first immigration enforcement operations, saying on Sunday that agents from the Justice Department were joining immigration enforcement agents to address a “national emergency.”
The Trump administration has vowed to ramp up deportation efforts, and enlisted the various law enforcement agencies within the Justice Department — the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and the U.S. Marshals — to assist in those efforts in Chicago and elsewhere.
Mr. Bove said in a written statement that he had watched agents from the departments of Justice and Homeland Security deploy in lock step “to address a national emergency arising from four years of failed immigration policy.” The Justice Department, he added, was working to “secure the border, stop this invasion and make America safe again.”
Immigration and Customs Enforcement said in a statement that federal agencies have started “enhanced targeted operations” in Chicago “to enforce U.S. immigration law and preserve public safety and national security by keeping potentially dangerous criminal aliens out of our communities.”
Mr. Bove urged local officials to aid in the effort, and warned there could be consequences for those who do not.
“We will support everyone at the federal, state and local levels who joins this critical mission to take back our communities,” he said. “We will use all available tools to address obstruction and other unlawful impediments to our efforts to protect the homeland.”
Gov. JB Pritzker of Illinois said on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday that his state would cooperate with federal authorities in deporting undocumented immigrants convicted of crimes or with pending deportation orders. But he emphasized that state law enforcement would not take part in targeted raids or profile people in the state who might be without documents.
Mr. Pritzker also said there was no new legal basis for the memo Mr. Bove issued last week indicating the department may investigate and prosecute officials in any jurisdictions that refuse to assist with the deportation crackdown. “They’re just putting that out because they want to threaten everybody,” he said.
Immigration enforcement is an everyday feature of the Homeland Security Department, which oversees agencies including ICE. But the Trump administration has vowed to devote more Justice Department personnel to those efforts as it takes more aggressive action.
Mr. Bove, who was part of Mr. Trump’s defense team in his Manhattan criminal case, is now overseeing much of the department’s day-to-day activity while the Senate works toward a confirmation vote on Pam Bondi, Mr. Trump’s nominee for attorney general. A vote on her nomination is expected this week.
Hamed Aleaziz and Minho Kim contributed reporting.
