The Latest: ICE, now freed of restraints, launches 'Operation Midway Blitz' in Chicago
The Department of Homeland Security’s announcement that immigration agents will flood Chicago in “Operation Midway Blitz” is stirring up fresh anxiety over threats of federal intervention in the nation’s third-largest city
President Donald Trump speaks to the White House Religious Liberty Commission during an event at the Museum of the Bible, Monday, Sept. 8, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
The Department of Homeland Security's announcement that immigration agents will flood Chicago in “ Operation Midway Blitz ” is stirring up fresh confusion and anxiety over threats of federal intervention in the nation’s third-largest city. President Donald Trump said Monday that he intends to send in National Guard members from other states as well.
The Supreme Court's emergency docket ruling Monday lifting a restraining order against stopping people based on indiscriminate factors like race, language, job or location is boosting Trump’s mass deportation agenda. Attorney General Pam Bondi applauded the decision, posting on social media: “Now, ICE can continue carrying out roving patrols" without "judicial micromanagement.”
Voto Latino co-founder Maria Teresa Kumar called it a “direct attack on Latino and other communities of color — with nearly 130 million of nonwhite Americans now potentially being subject to the Trump Administration’s racially motivated policing.“
Here's the latest:
‘Chipocalypse’ is now ‘Operation Midway Blitz’
Blasting what it calls sanctuary laws in Chicago and Illinois, the Trump administration said its latest effort targets people without legal permission to live in the U.S. who have criminal records. Its announcement of “Operation Midway Blitz” included mugshots of 11 foreign-born men it said should be deported.
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, who has been locked in a back-and-forth with Trump for days, and Mayor Brandon Johnson have defended the state and city’s extensive sanctuary laws, which bar coordination between local police and immigration agents. They're accusing Trump of using scare tactics, particularly with Latino residents in the nation’s third-largest city.
Democrats release suggestive letter to Epstein
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This image posted Monday, Sept. 8, 2025, on the X account of the Democrats on the House Oversight Committee shows a sexually suggestive birthday note to Jeffrey Epstein alluding to a “wonderful secret” and purportedly signed by President Donald Trump, who has denied sending the note. (@OversightDems/X via AP)
Trump denies he signed it, and Republicans are supporting this claim after Democrats on the House Oversight Committee posted a picture on social media of a sexually suggestive birthday message for Jeffrey Epstein in a birthday book.
The president has said he did not create the drawing of a curvaceous woman it includes. Trump has filed a lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal and its owner, Rupert Murdoch, over a report that described such a page in detail.
AP analysis: Presidentials taking longer to approve disaster aid
Disaster survivors are having to wait longer to get aid from the federal government, according to a new Associated Press analysis of decades of data. On average, it took less than two weeks for a governor’s request for a presidential disaster declaration to be granted in the 1990s and early 2000s. That rose to about three weeks during the past decade under presidents from both major parties. It’s taking more than a month, on average, so far during Trump’s current term, the AP found.
The delays mean individuals must wait to receive federal aid for daily living expenses, temporary lodging and home repairs. Delays in disaster declarations can also hamper recovery efforts by local officials, uncertain whether they will receive federal reimbursement for cleaning up debris and rebuilding infrastructure. The AP collaborated with Mississippi Today and Mississippi Free Press on the effects of these delays for this report.
“The federal government has turned its back on its own people,” said Bob Griffin, dean of the College of Emergency Preparedness, Homeland Security and Cybersecurity at the University at Albany in New York. “It’s a fundamental shift in the position of this country.”
White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said Trump is making sure federal tax dollars “are spent wisely to supplement state actions, not replace them.”
