Amnesty International report cites Chicago and Minneapolis enforcement abuses in call to abolish ICE
Amnesty International is asking the federal government to abolish U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The group said immigration enforcement operations in Chicago, Minneapolis-St. Paul, New Orleans and Washington, D.C. involved human rights violations that show the agency should be dismantled.
The organization released the report Tuesday under the title "We Had Whistles, They Had Guns: Human Rights Violations in U.S. Immigration Enforcement Operations and the Case to Abolish ICE." Amnesty said it interviewed 154 people directly affected by immigration enforcement operations in those four cities between March and June 2026.
The report examines federal immigration actions during Operation Midway Blitz in Chicago from September through December 2025. That period included the killing of Silverio Villegas-González by agents in Franklin Park.
Amnesty also documented federal agents killing Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minneapolis in January. The report connects those deaths to its finding that immigration operations have used unlawful force.
According to Amnesty, agents engaged in racial profiling and arbitrary detention based on skin color, ethnicity, language and neighborhood. The report says officers approached people with guns drawn, smashed vehicles and threw people to the ground.
The organization also accused agents of using excessive force against protesters, including at the Broadview immigration facility in suburban Chicago. Broadview is cited extensively in the report, which describes what Amnesty called inhumane conditions and long-term stays even though the facility is not officially designated as a detention center.
The report arrives as federal immigration enforcement remains under court scrutiny in Chicago. A federal judge issued an injunction in November with stricter guidelines on the use of force, one month after ordering officers to turn on body cameras during arrests.
Amnesty's call goes beyond proposals to reform ICE. The report argues that the abuses it recorded show the agency cannot be fixed and should be eliminated.
ICE did not respond to a request for comment about the report.
The release also follows a separate incident this week in Evanston, where witnesses said immigration officers detained a U.S. citizen after mistaking him for someone with an arrest warrant. A witness told the New York Times that agents left the man bloodied on the ground. The Department of Homeland Security told the Times the man had refused to cooperate and that agents offered help, but he declined.
University of Minnesota law professor Liliana Zaragoza, who appears in the report, said she grew up crossing the U.S.-Mexico border to visit family and knew a time before ICE existed.
