Chicago As they got ready to approach what they referred to as their target, a number of Customs Enforcement and Immigration officers, together with other federal employees, waited in unmarked vehicles.
Christopher Fragoso Lara, 25, is from Mexico and was convicted of aggravated battery, domestic battery, home invasion, and firearm possession, according to ICE. He had been seen by a surveillance crew at his place of employment, a tire store in Chicago, on Monday morning.
As Fragoso Lara was speaking to a customer outdoors in below-freezing weather, agents blocked off the street outside the establishment and took him into custody.
When NBC News was infiltrated with the agents during operations across the Chicago area on Monday morning, the arrest happened without any problems. Before dawn, the team of law enforcement officers left downtown Chicago and headed to the Berwyn neighborhood, which is located on the outskirts of the city.
Three door-knocking operations showed the time and manpower required for the activities, but they did not lead to any arrests. At least seven ICE and ATF officials were present at each facility, covering all entries and exits.
According to a source with knowledge of the operations, ten distinct groups of roughly ten federal agents each dispersed throughout the city on Monday. President Donald Trump ordered the raids, which took place during a series of immigration enforcement operations in several locations across the nation.
Over the past week, the Trump administration has made an effort to show the world that it is carrying out the president’s pledges to implement mass deportations as soon as he takes office.Before they doubled on Friday, last week’s arrest totals were comparable to those from September 2024, the most recent month for which statistics were available.
Data initially received by NBC News shows that 1,179 people were apprehended by ICE on Sunday. That number is the highest under the new government and surpasses the 956 arrests the agency reported on Sunday night.
Peter Sodini of Chicago was present when Fragoso Lara was taken into custody. He gave the ICE officers his thanks.
“I don’t mind an immigrant, but if they’re breaking our laws, they don’t need to be here,” he stated.
Fragoso Lara was then transported to an ICE processing center outside of Chicago, where inmates are fingerprinted, photographed, and detained until their deportation flights, which usually happen on Fridays.
He claimed to have grown up in the United States and that he would leave his 5-year-old daughter here in order to give her a better life if he were deported.
I’m not with her. Fragoso Lara stated that she was raised without a father and that he would advise Trump to give her another chance. I’m not old yet. Although I did make bad choices, I’ve grown up and realized how things are in this world.
On Monday afternoon, there were 25 men and one women at the prison, either being processed or held. They are only expected to stay for a maximum of twelve hours.
In the last week, the processing center has been especially busy, according to Frank Padula, assistant field office director.
We never stop,” he declared. “As you can see, there are many men processing here as well as waiting to be processed in the holding cells.
ICE was unsuccessful in identifying and apprehending their targets on Monday, but other operations, such as the one that resulted in the arrest of Fragoso Lara, were successful.
When ICE officers and others knocked on a door earlier in the day, nobody answered. They then talked to their target’s parents at a second stop, who said they had lost contact with their son. The cops proceeded to another place without seeming to inquire about the couple’s immigration status.
Despite claims that the crackdown is aimed at criminals, the Trump administration has raised concerns about collateral arrests, or the roundup of law-abiding migrants with different types of legal immigration status.
Collateral arrests are a possibility, according to Enforcement and Removal Operations Chicago field office director Sam Olson when questioned about them. Enforcing the immigration laws is our responsibility,” he stated. “There is a chance that someone could be detained if they are in the country illegally, regardless of whether they have committed any crimes.
The number of migrants apprehended, both those with and without criminal records, has not always been made public by officials.
However, according to a senior Trump administration official, only 613 of the 1,179 people arrested on Sunday—nearly 52% of the total—were classified as criminal arrests. The others seem to be either nonviolent criminals or those who have never committed a crime.
Being undocumented is a civil violation rather than a felony. However, it is illegal for an undocumented immigrant who has been deported to return to the United States without authorization.
Administration officials emphasized that since Trump took office, police had detained dozens of suspected members of the Venezuelan group Tren de Aragua in Colorado, among other deadly gang members. Nevertheless, at least 566 individuals who were arrested on Sunday were only detained because they lacked the legal right to be in the United States and had not committed any crimes.
While ICE attempts to apprehend criminals on a daily basis, Olson claimed that Trump has adopted a whole-of-government strategy in which other agencies are working together to accomplish this.