Workers

“There Is a War Against Us”: Worker Leader, Released from ICE Custody, Speaks Out

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This article is a joint publication of Workday Magazine and In These Times. Willian Giménez González is a day laborer in Chicago known for organizing for workers’ rights. He was part of a group that filed a federal lawsuit over the alleged beating and harassment of day laborers at a Home Depot. 

On September 12, federal agents detained him outside of his barbershop, beginning a 47-day ordeal in which he was held in the Broadview ICE detention center in Illinois and then moved to the North Lake detention center in Michigan. The abduction came in the early days of ​“Operation Midway Blitz” as the Trump administration dramatically ramped up the presence of heavily armed, masked federal agents throughout the Chicago area. Giménez González’s community responded with outrage and concern, rallying at the Broadview facility the day after he was detained.

Midwest

Visible and Invisible: How ICE Is Terrorizing Chicago’s Working Class

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This article is a joint publication of Workday Magazine and In These Times. When federal immigration agents thread through her Chicago neighborhood and circle above her home in a helicopter, Araceli hides with her husband. ​“You hear the whistles,” she says through an interpreter. ​“You hear the people yelling, ​‘Don’t go out! Stay inside! There’s immigration here!’ ” 

Sometimes they are forced to hide for days. 

“It’s alarming, it’s not normal, it’s like being in a crisis,” explains Araceli, who is 55 and originally from Mexico City, though she has lived in Chicago for 30 years. That means Araceli often misses work as an apartment cleaner and her husband misses work in construction.

Midwest

Chicago Day Laborer, in ICE Detention, Says He’s Facing Retaliation Because Supporters Are Protesting His Abduction

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This article is a joint publication of Workday Magazine and In These Times. Willian Giménez González, a known advocate for the rights of day laborers who was abducted by federal agents on September 12, is speaking out from ICE detention. 

He says that federal authorities transferred him from the Broadview, Ill., ICE facility, to a detention center in Michigan, to move him away from his supporters. “I believe I was moved to Michigan at the last minute because I had the support of the community, and because my lawyer and politicians were protesting outside the jail,” he said, referring to the Broadview ICE facility. 

“I believe that because I had people fighting for me, I was targeted for transfer to prevent my supporters from helping me.” The statement was passed to me by his lawyer, Kevin Herrera, who is also the legal director of Raise the Floor Alliance, a legal clinic and worker advocacy organization. 

Willian Giménez González, who is in his late 30s and originally hails from Venezuela, is one of five day laborers who filed a federal lawsuit in August 2024 against the city of Chicago, Home Depot, and off-duty police officers moonlighting as private security guards for the alleged harassment and beating of day laborers. His supporters say there is reason to be concerned that his role in the lawsuit made him a target of federal agents, and for 35 days they have been fighting to secure his release. “This sets a really dangerous precedent where we are seeing that if people speak up about their rights, they could be targeted for that,” says Miguel Alvelo Rivera, executive director of the Latino Union of Chicago, where Giménez González is a member. ​“What feels dangerous about all of this is the silencing of folks who advocate for their community.”

The lawsuit says the workers ​“have endured physical violence at the hands of off-duty Chicago Police Department officers as they have been targeted based on their race, ethnicity, and national origin and thrown to the ground, aggressively handcuffed, and beaten by officers in displays of excessive force.”

According to the lawsuit from 2024, on October 23, 2023, when Giménez González sought work outside of a Home Depot, he was pushed to the ground, repeatedly slapped, then instructed to sign a paper written in English that he ​“did not understand.” That paper turned out to be his agreement that he had been trespassing.

Midwest

How ICE Terror Campaigns Are Used to Discipline Labor

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This article is a joint publication of Workday Magazine and The American Prospect. CHICAGO – The last time Regina heard from her mother, Laura Murillo, she was calling from inside the ICE detention center in Broadview, Illinois, last Friday. “She just told us that she loved us. She seemed shocked, and she said she’s wanting to fight the case,” Regina says. Regina, 19, is standing at the street vendor booth in the Back of the Yards neighborhood of Chicago, where Murillo was detained.