ICE would need more money to expand use of bodycams in Chicago
crackdown, official says
[October 21, 2025]
By CHRISTINE FERNANDO
CHICAGO (AP) — Many federal officers assigned to immigration enforcement
in the Chicago area have body cameras but Congress would have to
allocate more funds to expand their use, officials testified Monday at a
hearing about the tactics agents are using in Trump administration’s
crackdown, which has produced more than 1,000 arrests.
U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis last week ordered uniformed agents to
wear cameras, if available, and turn them on when engaged in arrests,
frisks and building searches or when being deployed to protests. She
held a hearing Monday at which she questioned a U.S. Customs and Border
Protection official and a U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement
official about the operation and complaints that agents are increasingly
using combative tactics.
Kyle Harvick, deputy incident commander with CBP, said Border Patrol
agents who are part of Operation Midway Blitz have cameras. He said 201
are in the Chicago area.
But Shawn Byers, deputy field office director for ICE, said more money
from Congress would be needed to expand camera use beyond two of that
agency's field offices. He said no cameras have been worn by ICE agents
working at a building in Broadview, outside Chicago, where immigrants
pass through before being detained elsewhere. It's been the site of
protests that at times have been tumultuous.
Byers also explained that while there are surveillance cameras outside
the ICE facility, they record over previous footage every 28 days. Ellis
expressed surprise when Byers said that meant footage from before Sept.
18 was gone. The Broadview facility became a focus of protesters after
Operation Midway Blitz began in early September.
“All of that needs to be preserved,” Ellis said.
Near the end of the hearing, Ellis said she would allow attorneys to
question additional federal officials, including Gregory Bovino, the
Border Patrol chief who is leading CBP's Chicago operation and also was
central to the immigration crackdown in Los Angeles.
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A Federal Patrol agent walks into an ICE processing facility in the
Chicago suburb of Broadview, Ill., Monday, Oct. 20, 2025. (AP
Photo/Nam Y. Huh)
The hearing was part of a lawsuit by news organizations and
community groups witnessing protests and arrests in the Chicago
area. Ellis said earlier this month that agents must wear badges,
and she banned them from using certain riot control techniques
against peaceful protesters and journalists.
Then last Thursday, she said she was a “little startled” after
seeing TV images of street confrontations in which agents used tear
gas and other tactics.
Harvick defended the use on tear gas on protesters in a Chicago
neighborhood on Oct. 12, saying residents who had gathered “would
not allow agents to leave the scene.”
“The longer we loiter on a scene and subjects come, the situation
gets more and more dangerous,” Harvick said Monday. “And that's a
safety concern, not just for my brother Border Patrol agents but the
detainee and other people who come out to see what's going on.”
The government has bristled at any suggestion of wrongdoing.
“The full context is that law enforcement officers in Chicago have
been, and continue to be, attacked, injured, and impeded from
enforcing federal law,” U.S. Justice Department attorney Samuel Holt
said in a court filing Friday.
Separately, President Donald Trump's administration has been barred
from deploying the National Guard to assist immigration officers in
Illinois. That order expires Thursday unless extended. The
administration also has asked the Supreme Court to allow the
deployment.
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