New video, testimony to be revealed at hearings on Chicago's Operation Midway Blitz
Unseen video and never-before-heard testimony will come out Monday during hearings on Operation Midway Blitz in Chicago.
An independent board is sharing what it found after investigating the actions of federal agents during the immigration crackdown in the fall of 2025.
The commission said since October, its members have interviewed more than 60 eyewitnesses and reviewed nearly 100 hours of body-worn camera footage from federal agents who were involved in events occurring in and around Chicago.
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker created the Illinois Accountability Commission last fall to collect evidence from Operation Midway Blitz. He wanted formal documentation and a public record that could be used to pursue accountability in the future.
Commission officials said President Trump's team declined to appear at several past hearings to testify about tactics federal agents used.
The commission is focusing on at least 14 different incidents involving federal agents between September and October, in Chicago and in suburban Elgin, Franklin Park, Melrose Park, and Evanston.
On Monday, the mother of Katie Abraham will testify. Abraham was killed in a drunken-driving hit-and-run crash in downstate Urbana, Illinois, and an undocumented Guatemalan national was sentenced in the case.
At the start of Midway Blitz, a U.S. Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said the operation launched in honor of Abraham.
Also among those to testify are Marissa Vivoda, a Lakeview resident who was present when her block on Lakewood Avenue was tear-gassed by immigration agents in October; Brian Kolp, an attorney and former Cook County assistant state's attorney who saw tear gas deployed by agents in his Old Irving Park neighborhood that month; and Jennifer Moriarty, a U.S. citizen who published reports say was taken into custody by federal agents in Evanston.
The hearings on the commission's findings begin at noon Monday, and hearings are also planned for Tuesday. The commission expects its findings to be finalized by Gov. Pritzker on Thursday.
The Trump Administration began Operation Midway Blitz in September 2025. In the months that followed, thousands of federal agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection flooded the city, often in tactical gear and deploying heavy force against protesters, journalists, observers, and ordinary civilians as they carried out raids in neighborhoods, near schools, and outside courtrooms.
Complaints about the overuse of force culminated in a federal judge issuing a permanent injunction against the immigration agents, prohibiting them from using tear gas and other riot control weapons, requiring them to issue warnings before force and riot control measures were used, and ordering them to both wear and use body-worn cameras.
The incidents also prompted Illinois legislators to pass a new law with additional protections for state residents against "unjust" federal immigration enforcement actions. Signed by Gov. JB Pritzker in December, the law banned civil immigration arrests at courthouses, and allows anyone falsely arrested around court a path to sue for up to $10,000 in damages.
The law also set up new guidelines and protections for residents at hospitals, universities, and daycares, and allows people to file civil lawsuits against law enforcement officers who violate Illinois or U.S. constitutional rights.