Corina Pedraza, a local who volunteers helping Chicagoans recognize immigration enforcement agents, speaks at a Oct. 7 news conference on Chicago's Southwest Side. Pedraza said immigration enforcement agents have transformed life in Chicago neighborhoods.
Chicagoans attend a Oct. 7 news conference on the city's Southwest Side where local leaders called on local businesses to stop immigration enforcement agents from using their parking lots to stage operations.

CHICAGO – Ivy-covered walls. Some 40,000 people singing in the middle of the 7th inning. The hope of raising a white flag with a symbolic "W."

Gametime at Wrigley Field on Oct. 8, a National League Division Series matchup between the Cubs and the Milwaukee Brewers, carried on as if things were normal in Chicago. And the Cubs' hopes for another trip to the World Series stayed alive with a 4-3 victory.

But away from the Friendly Confines, residents say something never seen before is underway.

"Our communities are being terrorized by agents who are kidnapping people," said Corina Pedraza, a longtime South Sider. "People are living in fear of going out to get groceries, dropping their kids off at school, people are strategizing how to get three or five blocks to work."

Since President Donald Trump launched his immigration enforcement crackdown known as Operation Midway Blitz, life in and around Chicago has been upended.

The White House says the crackdown is aimed at catching "the worst of the worst" criminal immigrants. Local officials say it’s a power grab. Residents feeling the brunt of the crackdown say immigration agents are making life untenable.

Scenes from the blitz include a Mexican man fatally shot by immigration agents in the northwest suburbs; federal officials deploying chemical agents on protesters and journalists outside the local immigration enforcement facility; and agents rappelling from Black Hawk helicopters to raid a South Side apartment building in the middle of the night.

Department of Homeland Security officials said on Oct. 8 that they had "arrested more than 1,500 illegal aliens — including criminal pedophiles, murderers, child abusers, kidnappers, gang members, and armed robbers" in connection with the blitz. USA TODAY has not been able to independently verify Homeland Security’s arrests.

Most recently, Trump said he would jail Gov. JB Pritzker and Mayor Brandon Johnson for resisting the Trump's crime-fighting goals in the city. National Guard members are in the process of deploying to the area.

Here’s a look at how the blitz is impacting people in the Chicago area, from near the Wisconsin border to Indiana.

South Side parking lot stakeout

In the pre-dawn hours of Oct. 7, dozens of Chicagoans gathered near an empty parking lot off a busy thoroughfare on the South Side.

The early hour, they told reporters at the scene, was in response to the schedule they noticed immigration enforcement agents were keeping. They said they hoped to be able to document agents carrying out their duties.

Federal agents arrived at the parking lot in the Back of the Yards neighborhood in the early hours and used it as a staging point for operations. The Yards Plaza lot is off the major thoroughfare of 47th Street near schools and a Home Depot.

Residents say masked men carrying guns take people off the streets in the surrounding area and bring them to the lot to move them into a van to be taken elsewhere.

"We went from being this community that walks our kids to school or goes out to parks . . . Now the streets are empty," said Pedraza, adding she worries about students in the area witnessing agents at work. "Imagine being a first grader and seeing agents with military weapons, masked men. No child should have to pass through that."

'Agents have created a war zone in our community,' local alderwoman says

Among the people on hand in the pre-dawn hours was local Ald. Julia Ramirez. The city council member said she came out to fight back for residents she sees as caught in a "war zone."

"People can't live their lives the way they did before," Ramirez said. "Agents have created a war zone in our community."

Many of the people present were members of what’s known as the Southwest Side Rapid Response team, a group of volunteers that aims to document immigration enforcement actions and confirm sightings of immigration agents.

Pedraza, a team member, said neighborhood residents looking to leave the house will give her a call beforehand to see about the latest confirmed immigration agent sightings.

After assembling in the morning, team members were seen standing on corners throughout the neighborhood, notably at sites where immigration agents have been reported before, including a Home Depot.

The Southwest Side team is one of many active throughout the Chicago area. Many regularly broadcast confirmed immigration agent sightings.

DHS officials have criticized these efforts, saying that activists tracking federal immigration agents are endangering law enforcement officials who are doing their jobs.

On Oct. 8, the Southwest Side team reported sightings of immigration agents in the area that included the make, model and license plate number of the immigration agents’ vehicles.

Across town, on the Northwest Side of the city, another team reported seeing eight immigration agents' vehicles, including a white SUV with a Mexican flag on the hood. Locals believe agents are adding Mexican flags to cars to act as a decoy.

Teams in the suburbs also reported immigration agent sightings on Oct. 8, saying that in Oak Park, Berwyn and Cicero volunteers "were able to confirm that ICE was active in our communities and abducted at least two of our neighbors."

Rapid response teams respond to calls to a hotline organized by the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights. Spokesperson Brandon Lee said their role consists of documenting federal law enforcement, not interfering with their work.

Friendly Confines still full of 'joy'

Amid the increasingly aggressive crackdown, many in Chicago are trying to maintain a sense of normalcy and big events help eclipse the national spotlight that comes from immigration agents shooting residents or Trump calling for the governor’s arrest.

"It’s sometimes hard living your own life knowing all this is happening," said Jeanne Uehling, a Chicagoan of over 20 years attending the Cubs game on Oct. 8. "It’s surreal that at work I have to care about someone turning something in when there are helicopters landing and raiding people."

The downtown office worker spoke with USA TODAY outside Wrigley Field with longtime friend Julie Murphy. They said that they were going to the game despite the president calling Chicago a hellhole.

"We have to still feel joy and this city has so much joy," said Murphy, who originally moved to the city from the suburbs. "People outside the city, they don’t know what's going on, they think we're being rescued somehow."

The game and crowds teeming up and down Clark Street outside the stadium are just the latest example of the city letting loose to enjoy itself. During a break in the first inning, fans stopped to sing "Y.M.C.A." a notable Trump anthem which has also been a Wrigley Field staple for years.

Hundreds of swimmers recently competed in swim races in the city’s river for the first time in nearly a century. The inaugural Chicago River Swim comes after decades spent cleaning the former industrial waterway.

On Sunday, Oct. 12, the city is preparing for its annual marathon in which over 53,000 runners are expected to compete. The race showcases the city’s iconic downtown Loop neighborhood.

'Closed due to the situation'

Unpredictable immigration raids and the deployment of National Guard troops have the region on edge from up near the Wisconsin border to Indiana.

"Over the past few weeks we’ve all felt it, families afraid to leave their homes and go to school, parents kissing their kids goodbye not knowing they’ll make it home, that’s something nobody should have to live with," said Edwin Lagunas of Toluca’s Restaurant in Waukegan.

Lagunas, who was born and raised in the Chicago suburb, spoke at an Oct. 7 news conference held in response to at least seven people being detained by immigration agents in the area on Oct. 6.

The arrival of immigration enforcement agents has had a severe impact on life in the area, locals say. Toluca’s and other neighborhood spots had signs posted saying that they were "closed due to the situation" until at least Oct. 9, when a federal judge in Chicago is expected to rule on the question of whether National Guard troops may remain in the area.

Sandra Fajardo, owner of a popular indoor soccer complex, said that suddenly teams had begun showing up down players or cancelling games.

"What’s happening in our city right now is heartbreaking," the Waukegan native said. "Immigration agents are keeping people from enjoying the basic things of life."

(This story has been updated to add new information.)

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Agents have created a war zone in our community': Trump blitz upends life in Chicago

Reporting by Michael Loria, USA TODAY / USA TODAY

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