Trillbilly Worker's Party - Episode 413: The Monsters Of Midway (w/ special guests Evelyn Vargas and Antonio Gutierrez)

Episode Date: October 9, 2025

This week we're speaking with Evelyn Vargas and Antonio Gutierrez from Organized Communities Against Deporations (OCAD), about all the recent things going on in Chicago: Operation Midway Blitz, the Sept 30 raid on the South Shore Apartments building, Trump sending in the National Guard and declaring war on Antifa, and how the Democrats fit into all this Support Organized Communities Against Deportations here: https://www.organizedcommunities.org/ Support us on Patreon here: www.patreon.com/trillbillyworkersparty

And so, you know, Okay, welcome to the show this week, everybody. I am joined by my two co-host, Tom and Aaron. And we have joining us this week two very special guests from the great city of Chicago. We have with this Antonio Gutierrez and Evelyn Vargas. They are with the organized communities against deportations. And I wanted to have you. all on because obviously

everybody is talking about Chicago, right? Like, you know, Trump is sending troops to Chicago, National Guard troops from, I guess, Texas, uh, from other states. And I might add, not sending their best either. It's definitely,

not indeed. God, guys, you can't even chase away a guy and a petty fathering, you know. Um, but, uh, But, yeah, no, I kind of wanted to just, like, dig in a little bit to see sort of what's going on, what y'all are dealing with, what you've seen since the beginning of the year. Just as a little bit of an introduction, organized communities against deportations is a group of undocumented, unapologetic, and unafraid organizers, building a resistance movement against deportations and the criminalization of immigrants and people of color in Chicago and surrounding areas. And I, as a result, felt like y'all would probably be the best ones to kind of give us a little bit of a debriefer on what's going on.

So maybe the best place for us to start this discussion would be with an introduction to Operation Midway Blitz, which the Trump administration announced on September 8th, about a month ago. Can you all tell us, like, what is Operation Midway Blitz? and how have you seen it play out on the ground so far? Yeah, I can start. Again, Antonio, I prefer to pronounce Zedem. I'm one of the co-founders of OECD, and I've been around since O'KAD started doing this anti-deportition work for now over 13 years in the city of Chicago. So we have dealt with the aspect of targeting of our communities based on legal status

from different administrations, from the Obama to the first Trump administration, then Biden, and the second Trump administration. I think when we talk about Operation Midway Bliss, we need to talk about it from how it's impacting our community. I will say that this operation is a terrorist operation led by the U.S. government to attack and target our immigrant communities in the city of Chicago. and the way that is kind of playing out on the ground is by having rates happen in the middle of the night, such as in the building that is located at 7500 South South Shore in a predominantly black and immigrant community where individuals, about 37 of them were detained, where you have both U.S. citizens and undocumented immigrants in the spectrum of not being a non-citizen. being detained in the middle of the night, being carried out out of their beds, sometimes naked or with little clothing as people were sleeping.

Can you imagine being sleeping in your bed in the comfort of your home, and all of a sudden, eyes gets there, and it's tying your children, your family members, and it's taking them outside, sometimes prolonging that process for about three hours. We also saw the killing of Silverio Villegas Gonzalez, just a couple of weeks ago as part of this operation as well. And yes, Silberio shouldn't have left or shouldn't have tried to drive away from the encounter with dice agents. We always tell people to remain calm, to not lie to federal agents, to exercise your rights, even when they are being violated, and that ultimately an arrest is not the end. On the contrary, that tends to be when our work has started as Oked in regards to the resources and support that we can provide individuals that have been arrested by ICE.

I will also say that in regards to the intimidation that this operation is carrying, we are seeing civilians, U.S. citizens, also being intimidated by ICE agents who are actively trying to. get more and more aggressive instead of de-escalating situations where community responders are showing up to the locations where they're trying to carry a detention or an arrest of an individual that they believe is undocumented, sometimes without any type of probable cause other than the way that we look, the color of our skin. And all of this is based on the decision of the Supreme Court that happened about mid-September, kind of giving the green light that ICE could use racial profiling in a legal way to identify individuals for the purpose of detaining them and questioning them about their citizenship status or immigration

status in this country. And I think overall the operation is very much targeted to us as a Democrat like city and a Democrat like state that also has some of the strongest sanctuary policies and laws that prevent our local police departments from working with dice. And it's clear that this attack towards LA or Oregon or Chicago is a way to target those policies that are preventing our local agencies to working with ICE in the efforts of deportation and post-displacement of our community members. Antonio, I just want to say really quick, you know, while you were describing, um, this, this, you know, siege of, um, you know, Chicago, uh, black and brown communities.

I think that when people, one thing that people have to keep in mind is that, you know, it's not about, it's a dragnet, right, where it targets, um, you know, um, so-called immigrant communities, but as you said, it's racial profiling, right? So there are citizens, black and brown citizens swept up in it, you know, which, um, is very terrifying to me to imagine that, you know, you think that in this country where you have, you know, whether you're a nationalized citizen or whether you were born here because of the color of your skin, right? You have a black hawk helicopter, you know, swarming your apartment and dragging children out of their beds. And it's not even just about American citizens, but anyone at all who lives here is just something that is horrifying.

And I think that, you know, if you live next to someone who doesn't look like you, I think that should be alarming for you because, you know, what does that say about your safety, right, and your security, right? you know um and and yeah thank you for sharing that thank you the the there's several things there i mean one of which is the um so you mentioned the september 30 uh raid on the south shore apartment building and some of the tech tactics used there were very shocking and um you you know you had mentioned the racial profiling aspect there's this guy who i don't know if he's with CPB or if he's ICE, his name is Gregory Bovino. I've been calling him Gregory Bovine. He's so sort of like pension-esque name. That's an insult to cows. But there was a clip going around of him saying like, yeah, we're basically literally admitting like we are

racially profiling people. And as you pointed out, Antonio, like the Supreme Court ruled just earlier last month or in August that that was essentially constitutional to do. Some of the techniques they used in that rate, I thought, were very insane. Like, obviously, flashbang grenades, kicking in people's door. People had, there were reports of people having furniture and electronics equipment stolen. Obviously, you mentioned it, but, you know, marching children out naked in the middle of the night. And, I mean, for me, the Black Hawk helicopter is really insane. The, um, there is a kind of historical, uh, sort of trajectory here,

historical synchronicity. The, the Blackhawk helicopter is named after the sock, um, chief Blackhawk, who, you know, tried to basically take back lands from, um, that were rightfully theirs in Illinois in 1832 so you've got this like really crazy historical really weird inversion actually exactly right yeah like like yeah the black hawk war was in Illinois so it's like yeah you're from black awk war to black hawk helicopters hey but he did get a racist sports mascot named after him though so let's let's keep it in perspective yes who who which Chicago blackhawks the hockey team oh are they still they still have the name they're still the blackhawks yeah oh wow they oh god dude

Yeah, yeah, we got to change that like the Braves in Atlanta. Yeah, it shows you how much I know about Chicago sports. I'm sorry, I need to brush up on that. But, like, you know, something that people pointed out in the reports about this raid, this event, was the presence of multiple agencies. So you had, like, CBP, you had ICE, you had, like, I think ATF was there, FBI, right? Like, who, why are all these? I mean, I mean, can I just say? Can I just comment, too, that just like, you know, the intent of using a Black Hawk helicopter,

which is a military, you know, aircraft vehicle, it's like, what do you think you're going to anticipate? I think that it is just a show of, not just force, but is threatening violence against people. Like, I mean, I don't understand in what situation that you would think that you would need such an aircraft, you know, which is, I mean, it's a war. It's a domestic war is what it is. Besides, aren't most of these motherfuckers supposed to be furloughed right now? Well, I mean, I guess if they're not military or if they're not, they're not essential. ATF, though. I mean, they are essential workers, rather, I guess I should say.

Oh, God. Well, it's just like, you know, there's a joke in Kentucky. It's kind of, you know, it's like when somebody says, this must be a state job when you got like one working and seven just kind of standing around. That's like a quintessential example. Well, I point all that. out because one question I had for you all was like we can get to the National Guard deployments in just a second but like just dialing in on this raid for the moment I kind of just had a question like you've got the presence of all these different federal agencies like what is the federal

law enforcement presence on the ground in Chicago you know right now and like are you seeing any friction between federal law enforcement and local police like how is that playing out what's the dynamic there? Honestly, it's a love-love relationship. Like, if ICE calls the cops because they're feeling very threatened by people who are showing up to protest their actions, Chicago Police Department will come out and claim it for the protection of the community. But I really want to go back to Povino for a second because this man, I think, has

dreamt of playing with guns and tanks his whole life. Like this man willy-nilly throws out like gas bombs, you know, those little things that throw out smoke just out of car windows in streets. Like he's not even doing a lot of targeting. When he does targeting, he makes sure that it's caught on video. Like he's got this one guy documenting everything he's doing. look panicked when you see a Border Patrol agent. Perhaps you look scared. Perhaps your demeanor changes. Perhaps you're gripping the steering wheel so tightly that I can see the whites of your

knuckles. There's a myriad of factors that we would that we would look at to develop articulable facts for reasonable suspicion. Like he wants to feel good about himself and he is really making that happen. Like we know it was smoke bomb that went into an elderly person's house like i don't know what what the idea was there but the whole point is that they're throwing a lot of force into the city like we've got you know FBI folks here we've definitely got the police that get called out we definitely got you know border patrol we've got dhs here and they're pulling more people and bovino like if he doesn't get his way we've seen before that he can get like he can called daddy Trump and Trump will take out a judge because the judge had had said actually bovino you know

you can't go over there i want to say this was like north carolina like you can't go over there uh to that home depot and bovino was upset bovino didn't wanted to get his way so he called trump and trump was like you know what let me get that judge off the bench for you like this this man has i don't know that he has a plan because how we're seeing it play out on the ground is warrantless arrests, which just like Antonio said, the way that it's impacting our community is severely. But on the other side, it's also like, I don't, I don't know that this man just wants to make Chicago his playground and we're not a plaything. This is people's lives that are being impacted and nothing is going to get through to this man other than just pointing out how he's a

fool. I mean, it seems like to me, like, you know, terrorism, as Antonio said, right? But almost this strategy of tension, right? To inflict conflict, right? And still fear and terror in people's lives.

To, I mean, to what end, I don't know. Or it could just be, as you said, Evelyn, it could just be the childish fantasies of a guy who didn't get to play with enough tanks and soldiers when he was a child, you know? And now has the weapons to do so. But you would be a little upset, too, if you had to be raised with the name Greg Cal, you know.

It's very much, it reminds me very much of the Iraq War. Just like you've got these, you know, these guys who are very, like, I think, Evelyn, you pointed out one of the main things that I tend to focus on during this stuff is the fact that he's got, like, his own, like, press crew and camera crew that follows him around. And they intentionally try to, yeah, they try to do these, like, Iraq war type, like, profiles in courage. You know what I mean? Like, I'm on the grounds. Like, I, you know what I mean? Like, I'm a brave warrior for empire and all this. We're now, like, yeah, we're talking about Chicago.

Musa on a megadose of statins and my joints hurt. Also, a great warrior of empire in Chicago, you know, just to just to restate that, bringing the war home, you know what I'm saying. It's classic imperial boomerang. But like I just as a point of clarification, who does he work for? Like what is the agency that he's over? So he's with U.S. Border Patrol. Okay. So he's the guy leading that.

And he's the one that was working in California and got the huge Trump stamp of approval to come over to Chicago to make this happen. But yeah, just wanting to like emphasize how the way this plays out in our communities is he'll come with his crew of people and they'll target neighborhoods, like specific neighborhoods on any given day. And they're not, the pretext has been chipping away pretty quickly with at first it was like, well, we're just here and we're just patrolling. And then they started taking people without asking for any warrants. So just warrantless arrest and just pulling people. And they'll go up to people at bus stops. They'll go up to people who are dropping off their children at school. Like they're not going after the people that they said that they were going to go for.

And I want to be very, very, very, very clear that we are not in. We're not greenlighting any of this, no matter if they said, oh, this is just for getting the criminals off the ground because we don't think anyone deserves this. We believe that everyone should have a safe and dignified life. And so the point is that that was just a pretext to come and do away with anybody that didn't make sense to them. And most recently, we're seeing a lot of U.S. citizens detained. Again, this is not for us to be like, oh, you know, now finally it's serious. It's can you wake up and smell the coffee? Because the whole point of this was if you look black and brown and poor and anything that Bovino and Trump doesn't even want to see as part of the thread of America, then you need to get put out.

Exactly. So, Evelyn, I'm going to make a comment and ask a question to both to you and Antonio is like, You know, during the Clinton administration, Haitian immigrants were first detained in Guantanamo, right, because of the AIDS crisis, right? My family is from the Caribbean. They're from Jamaica, right? People who could have easily been grouped in into other, into, you know, undesirables. And I just want to ask you, this is during a democratic administration. And maybe, Terrence, you have this question, too, on the docket.

But I just want to, you know, I don't want to mean to, you know, bird the lead. But, like, what is the response of Democratic politicians, officials in the city? Because this is something that Democrats, you know, a couple years ago was screaming about kids in cages. But now that it's being done, not when it was under Trump, they were cool with it. When it was under Biden, they were fine. Now there's complete silence, right? There's a normalization. So can you just explain, like, what are Democratic officials doing about this right now or saying about this?

I think overall, you are right that they are trying to make their actions. and enforcement, and again, terrorism within our communities to become normalized and for people to not fight back and to not resist to make us believe that our rights have been taken away, such as the right to ask for a judicial warrant, if somebody wants to enter our home or a private property. I think overall what we're seeing with Governor J.B. Prisker and Kyle Mayor, Brenda Johnson, is that they are listening to those on the ground. We have had conversations with them as Okad and through our other partners like the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, and they can still do more. There's been attempts to enter the Broadview Processing Center, which is kind of the only detention center that we have in Illinois that tends to be a temporary space.

for people to be processed and then be taken to other detention centers and the conditions there are inhumane. There have been reports confirmed to us, right? That there are over 100 people in one room. All of them not having beds or access to showers or food being given to them. And when Democrats attempted to enter this processing center, they were denied entry.

And so we want to make sure that we continue to pressure are elected officials to do more than what they're doing. I think that they are doing what they can, having to fight the federal government or the government at the federal level in reinstating and leaning in into the advocacy and policies that we have set up

over the decades, whether it's the welcoming city ordinance or the city of Chicago that gives us a century status, whether it's the Illinois Trust Act or the Illinois Way Forward, that ultimately create the same century policy, at the state level, and that we're still seeing bad actors, right? There's still been some verified information that has come to our attention in regards to local police officers still working with dice and sharing information, even though they know it's against our laws and our policies at the stay and city level. And I think what Democrats could be doing is that they need to continue to listen to those.

on the ground to listen to those doing rapid response is to waste to protect them, to make sure that federal charges that are given to individuals just exercising the right within the state of Illinois of documenting an advisory that are protected and that those charges are dropped so that we don't get intimidated based on the work that we're doing in order to keep our community safe. I want to jump back to something Evelyn had said about the coordination between the police and ice like that they'll send the Chicago PD into sort of when they get in a little too far and that's a hilarious notion to me right like you got these brown shirt thug vigilantes

basically with no training who've just been called up and given a signing bonus to be Trump's little special guys on the ground or whatever and when you get in a little over your head you have to call the Chicago PD and to come get you out of hot water because you bet off more than you can chew or whatever it's just a just a sickening notion the whole way around that drives me into a kind of rage that it's hard to articulate yeah yeah i mean it's that i think that's kind of a good way to segue into my next question was going to be which is that like what is the um what has been the response to this like in in the community in in terms of like protests and mobilization like the um something that i was thinking about like during that

South Shore apartment rate on the 30th, something that was so striking to me from the article that I read, I think it was in the Chicago Sun Times, is that the name of it, that the management of that building had basically like stopped responding to all upkeep maintenance requests and that like a lot of the people in that building were essentially. essentially doing the work of maintaining it. The tenants themselves were maintaining the building, sweeping and cleaning the hallways and, you know, doing other maintenance on the building.

And so it seems to me that like partially what's happened here is sort of similar to what happened to Brianna Taylor in Louisville. Like it's maybe perhaps an effort by the landlord of the owners of the building to push people out and displace them. And they're using ice raids as a pretext for doing it. I wanted to kind of just see like you know you had mentioned this or hinted at it earlier Evelyn Evelyn but like what's been the community sort of response and and response to this and like maybe dig in a little bit deeper to like how is this affecting the communities and even

even I would even add to the living conditions of these apartments as you're saying Terrence right if you could elucidate on that Evelyn you know or Antonio yeah so Antonio and I are both part of of not just like immigration organizing, but housing organizing too. And Antonio has been doing this for many more years than I have. And honestly, it's like forever we've been saying this intersectionality is here and it's very real, that the folks who are experiencing awful landlords, terrible conditions, who have to move from building to building because the rain keeps going up. up that is inextricably linked to your identity as maybe someone who is an immigrant or as maybe

someone who is a person of color and that you are not just being dealt one bad bad card. You are being dealt multiple bad cards at once. And that this situation with the South Shore building and this management, it is not a what-if situation if you have a bad landlord or even just take away the bad landlord that landlords have so much power over those of us who rent and that we can't even say excuse me the the mailbox is broken for fear of being told well you know where the door is and it's the next person that comes in is going to get charged 800 more dollars because you don't want this apartment so it's your choice and so I think that the response to that sort of like there's a lot going on right because in general the response to what's

been happening in terms of folks who are not being directly affected or who maybe are considered themselves allies has been across the spectrum a lot of folks are really wanting to plug in and wanting to know what to do and a lot of them are joining our rapid response teams which are groups of folks who go out and verify ice sightings or who go out and document when someone's being abducted. And then there are other folks who are really aware that these intersections exist around our identities and are saying, like, the fact that ICE is here in droves means that we need to support our unhoused neighbors. And that's where they're putting that capacity means that we need to be more careful with those of us who are maybe in this particular

neighborhood and are going to be, are going to need a lot of support with food, right? And so that's where they're putting that capacity with like meal delivery. And so I think that there's this great understanding that intersectionalities are at play. And so it's not just about how do we support the immigrant community. It's about how are we present for all of us who all are vulnerable. And I think I'll end before passing it to Antonio, because I know you've got a lot of good insight around this, is like one of the, one of the like hot places around where ICE likes to do these like raids are at work sites where day laborers go to find work. And so usually day laborers are on home depots. Right. And this, this is.

These are men, women, young people who aren't even of age looking for work to do construction or painting. And ICE is going there purposefully because they know that that's a little hanging fruit for them. And that's, and like, Home Depot doesn't care. They hire Moonlighting cops. So the whole situation is we're very aware in Chicago of who is vulnerable. And there's a lot of us kind of trying to spread that work around. So it's not just focused on immigrant communities. But Antonio, I don't know if there was anything that came up for you.

Yeah, I think that we're still discussing the building at 7500 South Shore in Chicago. It's important to kind of highlight going to your point, Terrence, right, that there were other federal agencies that were part or that contribute and supported eyes with that rate that happened in the middle of the night. And the reason why that is is that the Trump administration, right within the first week after he got inaugurated, back in January, deputized all federal agencies in order to be able to do immigration enforcement. That, of course, creates a lot of confusion in our community, right? Because now if the FBI, the Drug Enforcement Administration, DAA, or any other federal agency contacts you or gets to your home, you actually do not know. or individuals do not know in our community,

whether they're there to actually carry on a criminal investigation for the safety of our communities, or whether they're there to enforce immigration law and impact families and individuals that are not criminals in order to put them into deportation. I think what we also talk about the circumstances of that building and the fact that the owner who lives in Wisconsin under this kind of hitting themselves

under an LLC and a company management company that is clearly a slum landlord is kind of contributing to also the fact that the property has been placing foreclosure and that ultimately these companies, whether it's the slumlord or whether it is other agencies that kind of contribute like the banks into these scenarios are all profiting out of forced displacement. And the way that OECAD has continued to understand forced displacement, right, is that evictions, deportations, mass incarceration and detention are all parts of forced displacement that unfortunately allow certain capitalist individuals and corporations to profit out of our forced displacement. And so those connections need to be made in regards to

what the bank brings to the table, what this landlord potentially could have connected themselves to ICE in order to carry on this rate that is still not verified, but we're looking into it, and how groups like GAO group who manages many of the private detention centers for ICE are all profiting out of these impact that these families and individuals carry on in order to vacate the building one way or another. We're also seeing a lot more confirmed instances of landlords using immigration status to retaliate against tenants that are just trying to let them know that there might be conditioned repairs in their units or their apartments,

which, again, they're paying rent monthly in order to also have that back and to be able to have a dignify apartment. But unfortunately, a lot of people are not complaining as much about the landlords or submitting reports to the city because they are afraid, and I think it's a valid instances of uncertainty in regards to whether the city will actually do their job and carry on whether. whether it's fines or take those individuals to court because of the conditions in those buildings,

and that ultimately, usually even when the city does that, and they find that a building is not suitable for living conditions for individuals, and even after that, the aftermath is never to go after the landlord or to punish the landlord. The result is punishing the tenants, and really literally tenants receiving a 48-hour notice in order to, to vacate the building because the city has encountered to be not suitable for living conditions. And I would like to say, why is the tenant being blamed for something that the landlord and the property management companies should be the ones addressing? Right, 100%.

I just want to mention real quick, too, living in Atlanta. And I know that people older than me, I grew up in New York. So people older than me saw this happen in, you know, neighbors in Brooklyn and Queens and in the Bronx. But, you know, seeing it happen in Atlanta since I moved here, I think that people really need to link gentrification with issues of immigration, mass deportations, racism, environmentalism as well, because what you see is that it's not just this aesthetic change or, you know, just merely socioeconomic change of a neighborhood, right? It involves these processes of pushing people the fuck out, right? of racially profiling people, right, of saying that you are not allowed to live here because we don't want you to live here, right? We want to reshape an entire neighborhood and maybe in turn

in a microcosm reshape the country, right? And that's what I'll actually say, right? I think the process of gentrification is a reshaping, right, of the country, right, that you see on a microcosmic level, right, that I think most people just think like, oh, we want development, but we want development shore without displacement. I used to, I've mentioned it before, but I used to organized for Housing Justice League in Atlanta down here. And, you know, just the amount of houses that would go to, a neighborhood that were targeted. And of course, they were predominantly black, but they were immigrant neighborhoods, right? They were, they were just blanketed as like, oh, we're going to wipe this way, right? And we're going to put in what we want and the people who we

want. And I just, again, I have to say, I think people have to see that as a process of, you know, white supremacy. And I think people might know that, but I don't think we hint on that enough, right? Yeah. No, and you're completely right. Right? When we look at the information that we have gathered because OkAD answers the family support network hubline, a hubline that anybody can call where we have responders from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. every day of the week and people can report either a nice activity or raid happening in real time so that we can then dispatch one of the Rapper Response teams that lives in those neighborhoods so that they can get there and document the interaction, make sure that people

Those rights are not being violated, and if they're being violated, that we have documentation of that so that that can support that individuals of elites and fight against that deportation. But we clearly see those numbers, and we see that 75% of the individuals targeted at least in Chicago are either Mexican or Venezuelan of country of origin. It's clearly that this is a project to continue whiteness and white supremacy in this country, in that other immigrants, even though there are white immigrants, living within the communities of Chicago, are not being targeted as much

because they are focusing on neighborhoods that are predominantly black and Latino or brown immigrants, that are predominantly being gentrified through forced evictions and an increase of rent, and that is all part of these renewal of those neighborhoods by displacing people either through evictions, deportation, or mass incarceration and detention. And that needs to be well documented, right?

There is a reason why after the Ukraine-Russian war started. Chicago received over 20,000 Ukrainian refugees that then resettled into our communities. And right now, those individuals are not being targeted by this administration. And why the only reason that we see that that is happening is because the color or the skins of the immigrants that were discussing. Yeah, I was, you know, I wanted to pull this quote out from the Chicago Times write-up of this.

It says in the South Shore raid, neighbors said federal agents used flashbang grenades to burst through the building and several drones and helicopters were deployed. Ebony Sweet's Watson, who lives across the street, said it looked, quote, looked like hundreds of agents were outside her front door. Watson said she saw agents dragging residents, including kids. out of the building without any clothing on and into U-Haul vans. Kids were separated from their mothers, she said. It was heartbreaking to watch, said Watson.

Even if you're not a mother, seeing kids coming out buck naked and taken from their mothers, it was horrible. And then she said, inside the building, stuff was everywhere. You could see people's birth certificates and papers thrown all over. Water was leaking into the hallway. I think that, like, you know, I think that obviously a big part of this is that it's intended to be a show of force and then also to reinforce that dehumanization of these people, because I think the end goal here, as we've all pointed out,

is the displacement. And I think, Antonio, you've made a very good point, which is that at this point, at this sort of late, you know, neoliberal stage of capitalism, displacement is a very profitable industry. And that means that the site of struggle is our homes and communities. And, like, essentially, that's what we're talking about at the end of the day. We're talking about defending our homes and our right to build a community with other people

and to have autonomy and protection and to live, you know, dignified lives. And I think that, like, their attempts to do these things, it's obviously meant to sort of, like, break people's spirit, but also to, you know, to make them think that their homes and their lives aren't secure. and protected so that they can more easily push them out and displace them. And I think that, like, this might be a good way for us to talk about the National Guard deployments and how the federal government, specifically the Trump administration factors into this. You know, Trump spoke to the, you know, generals at Quantico a few weeks ago with Pete Heggseth.

And, you know, he said that Chicago should be a training ground, places like Chicago. also talking about Portland, should be a training ground for the military. He's called for the jailing of Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and Governor Pritzker. In their statement for why they're deploying the National Guard to Chicago, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said that it's because of ongoing violent riots and lawlessness in Chicago. And, you know, I think that, like, maybe Evelyn, you pointed out before that, like, you know, judges will rule against this, and then they'll basically, like, steamroll over them and say, like, well, you're ruling doesn't matter. It seems like right now they've sent about 100 Texas National Guard troops to Chicago. Could we maybe just talk a little bit about, like, what that experience is like, like, you know, as Chicagoans, like, how does it make you feel that, like, Texas troops are now walking your streets?

Like, what is the, you're feeling about, like, the end game here? Like, how has this impacted your ability to organize and exist in your communities? I think it's a really, actually, interesting in the way that hasn't really been, like, the head. around what's been happening, because the National Guard is really a headline moment for Trump. It is a way to get attention to show, look, we're getting military on the ground. And I am exerting control over Chicago, and I am exerting control over these immigrants and undesirables. And that, like, that's the image that Trump wants to project, which is why the National Guard is here. And we have been preparing our allies and our supporters and the folks

that volunteer with us by reiterating that the National Guard doesn't have the right to arrest you as a citizen. But I can only speak for myself here. I find that there are parallels between this and the Vietnam War of folks being sent into a place that they themselves might not see the point of and that they themselves might not entirely agree with. And ultimately, as far as I know, I mean, this has just been this week that they've been here. Like, it hasn't even been a full week, so we don't know exactly where they're going to be positioned. But to our understanding is that they're going to be standing out in front of federal buildings. How does it impact? the community, it creates more confusion, more fear. Oh, I hear that, you know, the National Guard

is here. What does that mean for me? Am I in more danger? How can I tell the difference between ICE and the National Guard? You know, especially when ICE doesn't have name tags, comes in unmarked vehicles, will just like literally turn the corner, pull you into their, like, this is not an exaggeration. This is not me. It's not a hyperbole. Like they'll turn the corner, bring you into their vehicle and you're gone, you know? Like, there's that piece of the fear, but what does it mean in terms of like how it's going to play out with them as an additional player? I'm not quite sure. And I think it is definitely a power play between the governor and the president. But it's hard to say.

say what the people themselves are feeling. And that gives me pause. I personally am wondering, right, like, what does this mean? Because I don't, you know, none of them were thinking when I joined the National Guard, I'm going to be out here cutting the lawn of some federal piece of property. I think that they thought that they were going to respond to a tornado or a flood and we're going to be saving people and we're going to be treating people medically. And so, yeah, I don't know what's going through their heads. And that's a key piece here that they're being played with too. Evelyn, can I give you a perfect example, actually? Now I'm thinking about it. So when I was protesting in downtown Atlanta near the CNN Center during the George Floyd protests,

and the National Guard came in and I wear glasses and I got tackled. I got shot with a rubber bullet first, not a bullet it's the size of a soda can and it hit me and I was down and my glasses fell off and this National Guard dude picked up my glasses dusted them off and gave them back to me right after hitting you with the rubber

bullet well I mean the cops hit me with the rubber bullet the National Guard came and after that they cettled us so the National Guard came and after that I got hit with the rubbleet from the cops because fuck APD they don't give a shit right the black cops especially right but they hit me with the bullet the rubber bullet and I went down and the National Guard came in behind us and my glasses fell off and I cannot see

I'm blind and this National Guard, this guy picked up my glasses and dusted them off and gave them back to me. And I just mentioned that because that one like simple act of like sympathy, right, in this like incredibly violent moment which I thought I was going to get, I didn't know what was going to happen, right? It was very frightening for me. I still can't really process it. I'm just actually talking about this for the first time because it was such a traumatizing moment which is why we're talking to y'all to imagine that happening to people living in a fucking apartment complex right um but that i think is like um you know to to to add to question whether or not you know whether individual national national guard how the way they feel about it

um about being deputized like this i really do again want to bring back that i do feel like it is a strategy of tension and i think evelyn you're correct in bringing up it's confusion that's all the strategy of tension is a is a strategy of confusion right what you do is you confuse people, right? You not only confuse people by attacking them in the middle of the night, but there are all these designations that you think you have to make between the cops, the National Guard, ICE, and there's this mass collaboration going on where I'm sorry, a lot of people will say that I was just following orders, right?

You know, and that is the most troubling thing to me, right? That you'll have people that say, I was just following orders, but yeah, I'll pick this guy's glasses up and given back to him, right? after he's been shot with rubber bullet by APD, which I didn't do but I'm coming in after and sweeping it up. I mean, it's just a very confusing time for people and

and it's, I think it's meant to do that, right? I think you're definitely right. And I think it's important to highlight that by the time that we were done with the second week of September after Midway Blitz operation started, we saw the same amount of rates that were reported to us through the hotline that I was discussing earlier from January to the end of August.

The volume of rates has definitely increased, and that was before the National Guard was deployed here, which as Evelyn was saying, it is our understanding that they're here in Chicago, but we have not yet seen them or confirmed them in our communities or around federal buildings. I think that they're still trying to assess what that's going to look like. But we also have heard from organizers in D.C. and LA that have already been exposed to the National Guard is that they really have been there just to promote a sense of intimidation to those wanting to protest and chain eyes for the activities that they carry on in their communities. But that we know that National Guards cannot do arrest. We know that, yes, they have a lot of military like tools and equipment that does make them very intimidating when we're not. looking at them, but we know that these are civilians that live in our communities and that the civilian was pointing out that didn't sign up for this type of role, right? That they were there to respond to emergencies, whether we're environmental or any other type, and that this is

not an emergency. What is happening is that Chicago is not a war zone. The Trump administration has created a war zone attack towards Chicago, and that's what we're dealing with. And unfortunately, what I do anticipate that they're trying to create is this sense of fear, intimidation in regards to us employing and activating our First Amendment right in regards to being able to confront and resist these attacks and this ideology

that people that are non-citizens should be less than human and that therefore should be subject to this type of illegal tactics and violations of our rights. And so we still need to see kind of how the National Guard is going to show up in Chicago, but we know that they are not the threat of our communities. The real threat is Custom Border Patrol, ICE, all these other agencies

that are actually enforcing and arresting our individuals and that are placing them in private detention centers so that those become bodies that profit these big companies like GAO group. And so that needs to be kind of understood. And what I do see, is that Trump is sending the National Guard to ignite protests and violence, right? And that things are escalating because people are feeling that this is unfair, that this should not be happening,

that our government should not be terrorizing our communities, and they're showing their discontent, and they hope, I believe, that people will continue to escalate and get more aggressive with the National Guard and with dice, so that he, later than the road, whether it's this year or next year, he will be enacting the Insurrection Act in the process of the midterm elections happening in 2026 in order to suppress boarding, in order to suppress people showing up for that mid-election in order to continue to control all branches of the federal government, right? And so that is it is out there.

I don't think I'm the first one that is making those connections. It's definitely something that is out there for people to kind of continue to explore and understand that if you are getting agitated by eyes, if the National Guard is there to escalate things, it is only to serve the overall purpose to continue to hold power by the Trump administration. Yeah, I think that's a good point. that like if you're looking at this from an organizing perspective you want to look at the contradictions that have a possibility for sort of intervention or you know you you you want to look for like the weak points in their strategy and I think that like the the National Guard I think likening it to Vietnam is actually a really good analogy Evelyn because I feel like you're right like a lot of them are just you know kind of plucked out of their situation and put into this

one and maybe they don't even know why i mean i have a friend that was in the national guard here in kentucky and was sent to iraq like we did send the national guard to iraq not as combat um but uh but as security forces because the the point of of what we did in iraq was trying to rebuild the society basically in you know under sort of like white supremacists you know western terms even supposedly trying to rebuild actually yeah i mean i guess what i'm trying to say is like there was a provisional authority right like they tried to they tried to basically like reconstruct it from the ground up and um and i think that like maybe that maybe that's part of the strategy here as well like um i think that like what we're all sort of like

you know hovering around is basically um them trying to trigger some sort of larger uh state of emergency so that they can have pretense for creating a sort of a situation of martial law that you can then basically clamp down on elections, clamp down on any kind of like mobilization or dissent period, everything from freedom of speech to actual

street mobilization. And I think that like, I guess, you know, Aaron, you would ask the version of this question earlier, but like I kind of just wanted to, you know, maybe dig into this just a little bit more before we left. But like,

what do you think is going to be the response, I mean, this is probably a question you can't even answer, but maybe a way to ask this question is, like, let's talk about, like, people like J.B. Pritzker, for example, right? Are they the right leaders to push back against this type of, I don't know, you could say, like, federal invasion of an American city? Like, are they the right leaders? Without, like, you know, fully, like, you know, indicting them. I know we have to work with them in some way. But, like, what do you see would be the role of, let's say, a leader of maybe a liberal or leftist political movement. What would there, what would a adequate response to this be? I'm not sure if I'm going to like answer your question in the right way. And this might feel a little bit pie in the sky. But truly at the end of the day, like we save ourselves because like we have seen. already governors say

you can't bring the National Guard here and try to go through the legal system a legal system that should give us the right should say no y'all are right that's not how that works national guard

can't get deployed there and it didn't matter it didn't matter they're here so ultimately like we we can't count on one person to save or to be like the leader or the voice of the people, especially not a politician. And that goes for any, for any politician. Because at the end of the day, they're

working in a system that is meant to work this way. So what does it mean? What can, what can we do as people pushing against this? I mean, we can, we have to keep resisting. because our ability to exist is getting chipped away. The biggest fight apart from saving our folks is our ability to say what we're seeing. Because right now, the ISIS is trying to tell us that simply by recording, which is legally okay to do, we are doxing agents. and now they're or even you know like before that it was you can't record that's against the law or you know anytime anyone shares a license plate to tell their community hey i saw agents coming

out of this car here's the license plates that's also doxing you can't do that everyone can i just say something real quick too i just want to bring us up i mean i think body cams were a big thing that people were on about, about police reform a couple years ago. And I'm not seeing any body cams, right? I'm not seeing, I mean, they're wearing mask, but there's no actual documentation of what they're doing, right? Just to add on to what you're saying, I'm sorry to interrupt, that that's just a ship that I saw that is really troubling to me. The wearing of the mask, but also that no one's wearing body cams doing this stuff, right? And, and this is like, we know, we've seen that those apps that folks had been.

using to track ice whereabouts, those got taken off the app store because Trump didn't want them on there. Like we, anything that we can do to say people are being snatched off the streets, families are being ripped apart, people who are head of households can no longer provide for their families and are being put in really tense situations. we are being told every day that just to voice it is illegal. So what is it that someone can do? Just keep doing it.

Like spread the word. State support our ability to do this work. Don't qualify it. Don't say, well, technically it's legal to do that, to make sure that they're out there, Well, technically, you know, it's illegal that they won't be able to send national guards because it goes against the law. It's wrong, period. And we're out here defending our community in the best way we know how.

I think the only thing that we'll add, right, is that we understand that we keep each other safe and that there shouldn't be a savior, especially individuals that are not directly impacted, determining what our movement and our receiving. needs to look like. And as long as leaders like Governor Pritzker and Mayor Brandon Johnson understands them, I think that we can work and collaborate together for the efforts of keeping our community safe. But ultimately, I will say that any leader or any movement around anti-deportation or resistance of deportation and raids as the way that we're seeing them on the ground in Chicago and in other cities across the nation, that is not anti-capitalist. in the formation of the movement is inherently not going to work, right?

Because those connections need to be made in order to actually accomplish the resistance and the movement that we need, not only to address what is happening right now to undocumented immigrants, but to the overall scheme of fascism that is happening in this country. Trump just announced about a week,

a week and a half ago, that Antifa is now a terrorist organization, They had a whole roundtable discussion about it like yesterday. We're not going to stop at just arresting the violent criminals we can see in the streets. Fighting crime is more than just getting the bad guy off the streets. It's breaking down the organization brick by brick. Just like we did with cartels, we're going to take the same approach, President Trump, with Antifa, destroy the entire organization from top to bottom.

We're going to take them apart. Thanks to your bold leadership and the designation of Antifa as a terrorist organization, which is exactly what they are, Americans will no longer tolerate their unhinged violence. And what people do not know is that Antifa is not really a nonprofit organization as an entity. What they are talking about is that anti-fascist organizations are now terrorist organizations. So is that to say that we are not a fascist? government. And I think that people are not paying attention enough to those details to understand

that right now is us as undocumented immigrants being targeted. Tomorrow is going to be everyone else. And there's not going to be anywhere else left when they come for you. And if people don't take that seriously, I think that they do have all the platforms and the power to kind of do this behind closed door until it's too late for us to do anything. What is it that Jack or reprobate motherfucker. I don't know his last name. I don't know how to pronounce it. Jack or proboscisiac or whatever. Probiscis.

Probiscus? Whatever, man. This guy, that's a nose. That's what that is. Probiscis monkey. That's a nose. What this guy said, man, yesterday just kind of blew my mind is he said that Antifa goes back 100 years to Yimar Germany. Antifa is real. Antifa

has been around in various iterations for almost 100 years in some instances, going back to the Weimar Republic in Germany. I posted this, but it's like, bro, like, you couldn't say, you couldn't be more clear about the fact that you're an actual Nazi. And I know we throw the more the term of fascism around a lot. And I think people spent too much time debating whether Trump was a fascist or not, right?

I mean, people spent too much time debating, like, these specific ideologies instead of actually as we're talking to you guys, like talking about the shit that people are actually going through, right? The authoritarianism that we're actually facing. And the fact that you could have a roundhouse, a roundtable discussion in the White House about Antifa is this domestic terrorist organization. You're right, Antonio. It's not something that you can target, right? Because it's not, it's not like targeting DSA even, I guess I would say, right?

You're targeting the ideology. Although they've been specifically called out to. What are you going to do just like drone bomb anybody that was in DSA or something? Like what, like, you're going to get a, you're going to Joe Bob, the small meeting I go to when it's like eight white people. and myself. No, I mean, seriously, though, dog, it's like, it's just like, what are we, I think that you're right. You're, you both are right is that, um, you know, we take care of each other, you know, and I think that they recognize that, that, and Tom, you said this, I think the last episode, too, that we have power in numbers and they know that, right? They know that. And that's what

makes them terrified because any sort of, any sort of, any sort of, um, the admission of weakness is the over, the overhanded, like, kind of violence that they use, right? That's a, the mission of weakness in my opinion, right? Because they have to use that violence to repress people because otherwise, if you didn't use that kind of violence, then you would be swept the fuck away. But they have to do it, right? And I think people need to recognize that, again,

as you said, Tom, and as you've said Antonio and Evelyn, like, that there are power in numbers and we cannot rely on any one politician do any of this for us, right? Yeah, I mean, if you look at the claim, like, what are the competing claims here? Like, I think about that photo that's been circulating of

that masked ice agent pointing his gun at the passenger side window of a car of someone who was trying to record them. And, you know, and then obviously all the other horrific stories you hear about them, kicking people out of their homes, flash banging apartments, all this. Their claim is that essentially you have no right to safety. You have no right to live, essentially, the life that you would like to live. and so our competing claim is no we

fuck that we have a right to life we have a right to live we have a right to be comfortable and safe and live a dignified life as you pointed out at Evelyn those are the competing claims and I don't know

it's like Tom says like don't don't ever come after a man's mill ticket like we'll see which one of those competing claims wins I don't I don't you know you can have all the military hardware and gear and whatnot that you want but at the end of the day like it's a fight for survival and it's an existential fight.

And so I just want to thank you both for coming on and talking about this. It's been very great. And I just want to ask, like, could you tell us just a little bit about your organization and how people can support it if they would like to? Yeah, people can go on a website, Organized Communities.org. There's a tab about how to get involved all the way. from volunteering your time if that's what you want to do with the NOKA or donating or finding closest organization

in your area, in your city, in your state, so that you can get plugged in. We also urge people to follow us on social media and Instagram, Oka, Chicago, so that you can kind of stay alert as to calls to action, whether it's rallies and marches and showing up, or whether it's donating to funds, for impacted families

that have been separated by deportation and detention or whether it's to provide and create your own undocumented group or neighborhood watch around organizing to document ice rates, right, and to exercise our rights

before we normalize this behavior and the government wanting to strip us from the opportunity of pursuing happiness in life as is stated by the U.S. Constitution and really that just kind of making sure that people are not suppressing themselves and that instead find spaces to organize and to continue to actively resist the threat that we're facing at this moment. Well, thank you so much.

I'll put that link in the show notes. The organization is organized communities against deportation. And like I said, I'll put that link in the show notes. Evelyn Vargas, Antonio Gutierrez, thank you so much for joining us this week. And, you know, please, we'd encourage our listeners, please go support them. You can also support us on Patreon if you would like. That link is in the show notes as well. Hopefully we can have you all back on soon. Hopefully the news will be a little bit better.

But regardless, you know, we support you and encourage our listeners to do the same. So thank you again so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm going to be able to be. I don't know.

You know, you know, Thank you.