As President Donald Trump mulls sending the National Guard to Chicago, Mayor Brandon Johnson delivered a defiant message to the White House at a spirited Labor Day rally Monday.
“No federal troops in the city of Chicago! No militarized force in the city of Chicago!” Johnson said in a short speech, delivered steps from the Haymarket Memorial, at the site of the 1886 labor rally and bombing.
“We’re going to defend our democracy in the city of Chicago,” Johnson added. “We’re going to protect the humanity of every single person in the city of Chicago.”
The mayor of the nation’s third-largest city spoke alongside a group of labor leaders as Trump administration officials have said an Immigration and Customs Enforcement blitz is set to take place in Chicago in the coming days.
The Republican president has criticized Washington, D.C., and Chicago — Democratic bastions led by Black mayors — for out-of-control street crime, despite crime rates dropping in both cities.
Trump has repeatedly floated the idea of sending military into city streets for domestic purposes, which Johnson, Gov. JB Pritzker and legal experts have said is unconstitutional. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem this weekend said it would be up to Trump whether National Guard troops are part of the Chicago operation.
The president has recently deployed the National Guard to Washington and has threatened to do so in Chicago. In both instances, it appears the White House’s main focus will be on ramping up immigration enforcement by utilizing an influx of federal forces to carry out aggressive tactics.
Hundreds of residents turned out Monday to oppose the president’s plans. They carried signs criticizing Trump and declaring “Wake up and smell the fascism.”
Chicago Federation of Labor President Bob Reiter ripped Trump as a “bad dude” for failing to honor union contracts and scapegoating immigrants and diversity initiatives for the nation’s problems.
Stacy Davis Gates, the president of the Chicago Teachers Union and a close Johnson ally, credited working people for creating social change against slavery and fighting racist laws in the Jim Crow era. She said Chicago rejects “a billionaire’s tyranny on our city.”
“Solidarity is the antidote to white supremacy. Solidarity is the antidote to anti-immigrant fever. Solidarity is the antidote to homophobia and transphobia,” Davis Gates said. “Solidarity is the antidote to people not having and needing. It is solidarity that reunites us.”
After the rally, the labor groups protested outside entities allied with Trump or his initiatives, including Target and a Tesla dealership. Target has faced criticism for scaling back diversity, equity and inclusion efforts in what some say is an attempt to pander to Trump, while Tesla boss Elon Musk has been a close ally of the White House, having headed Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency initiative. Trump and Musk, however, have been in conflict recently.
Randi Weingarten, head of the national American Federation of Teachers, summed up the rally with a question invoking the biblical story of Moses in ancient Egypt.
“Are we ready to fight Pharaoh?” Weingarten asked. The crowd responded with cheers.
