Chicago Police rushed Alderwoman Julia Ramirez away from Mayor Brandon Johnson’s proposed site of a “migrant tent city” in Brighton Park after local residents gathered Thursday to vociferously oppose the project.
Hundreds of angry residents gathered on the Southwest Side near 38th Street and California Avenue, where Johnson is planning to erect a tent city for illegal border crossers, even as winter approaches.
City crews have been cutting down trees, clearing ground clutter, and leveling the ground in preparation for the construction of the migrant housing facility.
The 12th Ward Alderwoman arrived on the scene quietly with an aide, but once protesters recognized her, they began to confront her about the mayor’s plans. According to the Chicago Tribune protesters began yelling and surrounded her aggressively.
“The protesters, mostly Latino and Asian, had been holding signs in English and in their native languages with messages for the mayor and Ramirez, demanding that the construction in the area cease immediately,” the paper reported.
Eventually, Chicago Police Department (CPD) officers pushed through the crowd, pulled Ramirez out from the center of the crowd, and rushed her away from the scene.
Ramirez later issued a statement saying she attended the protest to engage with detractors of the plan to “address misinformation being spread” about her involvement in Johnson’s plans.
“After a few conversations, it became clear that most of the protesters did not want to engage in a peaceful dialogue with me,” Ramirez explained in her statement. “As I was leaving the protest, a group of protestors surrounded me and my staffer and began assaulting us.”
Ramirez also claimed that her aide was injured and taken to a hospital but is in good condition.
The protesters held signs in Spanish, English, and other languages with slogans such as “Protect Our Community.”
They say that a migrant encampment will drive down their property values, create security concerns, and increase crime.
Many also remarked that they were tired of seeing migrant shelters springing up in black, Asian, and Hispanic communities but not in the more upscale areas of the North Side.
Some local resident had been engaging in civil disobedience, such as intermittently blocking streets and entrances to the area to impede construction vehicles from gaining access to the area.
Mayor Johnson blasted the protesters in a statement after the Ramirez incident, saying, “Any violent act against an elected official in our city is unacceptable and must be condemned in the strongest terms.”
“My administration supports the right to peaceful protest and free speech, but this type of action against a public servant is unconscionable,” Johnson added. “Any violent act against an elected official in our city is unacceptable and must be condemned in the strongest terms.”
Windy City Mayor Brandon Johnson announced the tent city plans early in Sept. and claimed that he was looking to stash about 1,600 illegals in the camps.
Meanwhile, City Hall reported that GardaWorld and its subsidiary Aegis Defense Services has been handed a fat $29.4 million contract to run the tent city camp.
Johnson’s shelter plans have met with stiff resistance in nearly every case, especially since many of the facilities were planned and opened without notifying or involving the communities in which they were placed.
Most recently, residents of the mostly Hispanic Pilsen neighborhood organized a protest at a townhall meeting on Oct. 3.
And a poll taken the next week found that most Chicagoans want to put an end to the “sanctuary city” policies in the wake of the flood of illegals entering the city.
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