The Rev. Marshall Hatch urged congregants of a prominent Black church on Chicago’s West Side to carry identification, stay connected to family and protest as the city readied for an expected federal intervention.

“We’re next up from this focus on the migrants. And I challenged people, I said when you start hearing this administration talking about crime, they're talking about us. It's a euphemism, a code word for focus on the African-American community,” said Hatch during Sunday worship.

As Chicago braced for an immigration enforcement crackdown and a possible National Guard deployment, churches across the city turned up their response from the pulpit. Some worked to quell fears about detention and deportation while others addressed the looming possibility of more law enforcement on the streets of the nation’s third-largest city.

President Donald Trump has threatened federal intervention in Democratic strongholds, most recently warning apocalyptic force could be used in Chicago to fight crime and step up deportations. He’s repeatedly cited the expected plans over fierce objections from local leaders and many residents who call it unnecessary and unwanted.

While fears have been high in immigrant circles since Trump took office the second time, the threat of more federal agencies and troops has also inflamed tensions, particularly in Black and Latino communities where trust in police is fragile.

Details on the expected intervention have been sparse, including its focus and when it’s expected to begin. Trump’s border czar Tom Homan said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” that federal law enforcement action will come to Chicago this week. He also promised more worksite enforcement operations like the massive one at a Hyundai plant in Georgia.

Most of Chicago’s nearly 3 million people are Black or Latino. New Mount Pilgrim is located in the city’s West Garfield Park neighborhood, a largely Black neighborhood which has faced persistent crime and years of disinvestment, including five schools near the church that closed in 2013 as part of the largest mass public closure in U.S. history.

Hatch said his community needs investment–not a military occupation.

“This is a community starved for resources, and that has a lot to do with the violence in the community. Young people in various states of desperation, families that are fragile, housing and food insecure,” he said.

AP video by Mark Vancleave