‘No Trump, No Troops’: Protestors fill downtown Chicago streets to oppose Trump administration’s immigration crackdown

CHICAGO (WGN) — Protestors took to Michigan Avenue in downtown Chicago on Saturday evening, rallying against President Donald Trump’s plans to send federal troops to the area for expanded immigration enforcement.

The “No Trump, No Troops” protest began at 5 p.m. at the intersection of Ida B. Wells Drive and Michigan Avenue near Grant Park. Demonstrators then marched, stopping briefly at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) office, the Dirksen Federal Building and Trump Tower.

“We cannot accept the divide-and-conquer rhetoric that calls our neighbors criminals, calls our siblings illegals,” Kobi Guillory, an activist with the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression (CAARPR), said.

Thousands flocked to downtown Chicago to condemn what they called a dangerous agenda by the Trump administration that targets immigrant communities under the false pretext of crime reduction.  

“Terrorizing our communities by sticking the National Guard against its own people,” Viviana Barajas of Palenque Liberating Spaces through Neighborhood Action (LSNA) said.

With reports of a potential federal intervention, safety marshals stayed alert along the march route.

Trump threatens Chicago in post

On Saturday morning, prior to the protest, Trump shared an image post on Truth Social hinting at the potential raids.

In the photo, which appears to have been generated using artificial intelligence, the president can be seen sitting on a beach in Vietnam War-era military fatigues, with the Chicago skyline behind him as a fire burns to his left and a collection of military helicopters flies nearby.

Additionally, the image has the words “Chipocalypse Now” written on it, a play on the 1979 dystopian Vietnam War film “Apocalypse Now.”

“I love the smell of deportations in the morning …,” Trump’s image post reads. “Chicago about to find out why it’s called the department of WAR.”

The president signed an executive order Friday aiming to rebrand the Department of Defense as the Department of War.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson took to social media to respond to the president’s threat. He wrote:

“The President’s threats are beneath the honor of our nation, but the reality is that he wants to occupy our city and break our Constitution. We must defend our democracy from this authoritarianism by protecting each other and protecting Chicago from Donald Trump.”

Gov. JB Pritzker also chastised Trump on the social media platform X. The governor wrote:

“The President of the United States is threatening to go to war with an American city. This is not a joke. This is not normal. Donald Trump isn’t a strongman, he’s a scared man. Illinois won’t be intimidated by a wannabe dictator.”

Demonstrators say the image was another attempt to incite fear, vowing to continue their fight for immigrant rights and against the targeting of their communities.

“Every single immigrant is a human. Every single immigrant has every single right to have their families stay together,” Francisco “Paco” Amador, Pastor of New Life Community Church in Little Village, said.

In the northern suburbs, about 300 ICE agents and possibly the National Guard will be working out of the Great Lakes Naval Station in North Chicago. Over a hundred protestors mobilized outside the naval station Saturday in opposition to the Trump administration’s plans.

A judge recently ruled Trump’s use of the military in Los Angeles was illegal, and Washington, D.C., also filed a lawsuit over the National Guard’s deployment there.

As recently as Wednesday, Vice President J.D. Vance said there were no immediate plans to send Guardsmen to Chicago.