She got to the base’s main gate at 6:30 a.m. Wednesday, dressed in her Army boots and a red and black dress adorned with embroidered flowers, one of two identical dresses she and her daughter received from her aunt on a family trip to Guadalajara.

The boots, she said, were for confidence, the dress to symbolize her Mexican heritage.

Lina Alvarez spearheaded a protest outside Naval Station Great Lakes on Sept. 6 that drew hundreds of people opposed to its use as a base of operations for President Donald Trump’s planned immigration “blitz” on Chicago.

Four days later, the 42-year-old retired U.S. Army sergeant first class returned to the North Chicago base alone, carrying two flags — American and Mexican — bound together as one and a poster board on which she wrote in green marker:

IMAGI

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