Cicero, Illinois – The morning began like any ordinary day. Rafael Veraza, 33, was on his way with his wife and their one-year-old daughter to Sam’s Club, a wholesale store west of Chicago’s city limits. A few minutes later, pepper spray filled the air (see video), people were screaming on the asphalt, and an asthmatic man was gasping for air with a burning chest while his child struggled to breathe in the back seat.
“He started spraying from the front of the car toward the back,” Veraza said. “I got hit straight in the face.” The cellphone video he later showed is shaky, but the panic is unmistakable. “I’m asthmatic. In that moment, I couldn’t breathe,” he said. His daughter Arianna, barely a year old, also inhaled the gas. Both were briefly hospitalized. “My daughter was trying to open her eyes,” Veraza said. “She was struggling to breathe.”
The U.S. Border Patrol does not confirm the incident – on the contrary: the Department of Homeland Security released a statement denying everything. “No,” wrote Tricia McLaughlin, a spokesperson for the department, “no pepper spray or crowd control agents were deployed in a Sam’s Club parking lot.” Yet, in the same statement, she listed that in Chicago over the weekend, law enforcement officers had been shot at, hit with bricks, rammed by vehicles, and attacked.
According to DHS, Border Patrol agents had entered the Little Village neighborhood to “control a crowd.” What that looks like, we know – and we’ve seen it often enough live. There, according to the department’s account, shots were fired from a black Jeep Wrangler directly at the agents. Shortly after, they retreated in a convoy, pursued by angry residents. In the Sam’s Club parking lot in Cicero, a car allegedly rammed a patrol vehicle, and then the agents withdrew again. “After leaving the parking lot, the convoy was attacked once more,” the statement read. A window was broken, and photos of the damage were released by the department. See also our article at: https://kaizen-blog.org/en/ein-morgen-in-little-village-schuesse-pfefferspray-und-ein-kind-in-der-brutalitaet-der-operation-midway-blitz/
No explanation, however, as to why Veraza and his family – who had simply tried to leave the parking lot – were pepper-sprayed amid the chaos. “I wasn’t doing anything,” Veraza said. “I was just trying to exit.”
Congressman Jesús “Chuy” García, who accompanied Veraza, called it a “campaign of terror against Chicago.” García also urged people to remain calm and continue documenting what they witness. “I understand the anger. I understand how many people feel. But if we give in to violence, we lose our fight. Then our message gets lost.” DHS maintained its line: the protesters were “rioters.” Nine people had been arrested, eight of them U.S. citizens. Whether any were charged remains unclear. In a lengthy statement that afternoon, the department said Border Patrol had been “attacked during an immigration operation” in Little Village. A man in a black Jeep had fired “multiple shots,” bricks and paint cans were thrown from rooftops, and agents were surrounded by “violent mobs” that damaged and repeatedly rammed vehicles. No agents were injured, DHS said, but nine people were arrested – blaming the escalation on “sanctuary politicians and the media.”
McLaughlin doubled down: “J. B. Pritzker and Brandon Johnson have created an environment of lawlessness and encouraged attacks on federal officers. In less than three hours in Chicago, Border Patrol faced gunfire, violent mobs, bricks, and four vehicle assaults. This violence is the result of vitriolic smears from local politicians and the media. Just last week, our officers were falsely accused of raiding a daycare center – now there’s silence while they come under fire.” And then came the sentence now being quoted across Chicago: “To all Antifa terrorists in Chicago: you will not stop us. Anyone who lays a hand on an officer will face the consequences.” Trump had already ordered in September that the loosely organized Antifa movement be officially designated a domestic terrorist organization – a move widely criticized by legal scholars as unconstitutional. Antifa is not an organization but rather a collective term for antifascist groups that confront far-right and racist demonstrations.
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson issued his own statement – sober but unequivocal. “The recent escalation of violent federal immigration enforcement activity threatens the safety of all Chicagoans,” he wrote. “Their reckless behavior and indiscriminate use of chemical agents have caused chaos and fear in our communities. I strongly reject this conduct but equally condemn any form of violence against officers.”
Johnson referred to DHS reports of an alleged shooting at a federal agent but also recalled a recent federal court ruling that found immigration enforcement agents “lacked credibility” in describing both their own actions and those of Chicago residents. “I have asked Superintendent Snelling for a full report on CPD’s presence during these operations to ensure that we remain in full compliance with our Welcoming City ordinance,” Johnson said. A police officer had also been injured when a vehicle struck a barricade. “Violence against police officers is unacceptable and will be condemned in the strongest terms.” Johnson then addressed the residents of Little Village directly: “To our residents who are providing care and protection during this time – document what happens, inform your neighbors of their rights, and keep a safe distance from federal agents.” Thus ended a day when a father tried to help his daughter open her eyes while a government tried to shift the blame. A burst of pepper spray in a parking lot – and a country that seems to have forgotten that its Constitution applies beyond Washington.
Even though our investigations often reveal distressing images and details, it would be wrong to remain silent about them. Especially in looking toward Europe, it becomes clear that many of the political tendencies seen in the United States are already emerging – sometimes more quietly, but just as consequentially. Our reporting aims to make this visible: that right-wing populism cannot be fought only once it has become reality, but must be confronted early – with clarity, facts, and its own imagery – to perhaps prevent such scenes from one day appearing in Europe as well.
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