By Emily Schmall
CHICAGO, March 13 (Reuters) – The leading three Democratic contenders facing off for Illinois’ open Senate seat on Tuesday have vowed to extensively reform or eliminate U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a reflection of how the killings of two U.S. citizens in Minnesota earlier this year have elevated immigration as a top issue for the party in this year’s midterm elections.
A strong stance against U.S. President Donald Trump’s immigration policies has worked elsewhere. In New Jersey, Analilia Mejia won a special congressional Democratic primary in a crowded field on a pledge to abolish ICE, the lead agency sending masked and heavily armed officers into U.S. cities to enforce Trump’s aggressive deportation targets.
Such positions could be perilous for Democrats as the general elections loom in November, though that risk may be less pronounced in Illinois, a reliable Democratic stronghold where a Republican has not won statewide office since 2014.
Retiring Senator Dick Durbin, 81, has been a titan in the liberal wing of the Senate for decades and a staunch defender of immigrant rights, pushing for legislation to give immigrants who came to the U.S. as children a pathway to citizenship.
The leading candidates to replace Durbin have taken up immigration reform, especially of ICE, as Trump’s approval rating on the issue has declined from 50% a year ago to just 39% at the end of February, according to Reuters/Ipsos polling.
U.S. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi wants to “abolish Trump’s ICE.” Illinois Lieutenant Governor Juliana Stratton, who marched with protesters during a deportation blitz in Chicago last fall, has called for eliminating the agency outright. U.S. Representative Robin Kelly has gone even further, saying the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, should be “dismantled,” and its outgoing secretary, Kristi Noem, impeached.
“Given that the policy differences are relatively minor, the differentiation is the edge in which you’re bringing the opposition,” said Ruth Bloch Rubin, an associate professor of political science at the University of Chicago.
The winner of the primary will face one of six Republicans who are running, though political analysts rate the race as solidly Democratic. Krishnamoorthi, a moderate who was first elected to Congress in 2016, had a 22-point advantage over Stratton in Emerson College’s January poll and had raised more than $30 million to Stratton’s $4 million and Kelly’s $3.3 million by the end of February, Federal Election Commission records show.
More recent polls have given Stratton the edge after Illinois Governor JB Pritzker contributed $5 million to her campaign through the billionaire’s family PAC, helping to pay for ads that feature people, including fellow endorser Illinois Senator Tammy Duckworth, cursing at Trump.
IMMIGRATION
Some political analysts believe the hard-line stance against ICE could be a threat to Democrats running nationwide. Trump won the White House in 2024 vowing a sweeping crackdown on immigration, and in 2020, Republicans turned progressive calls to “defund the police” into a campaign theme that hurt Democratic congressional candidates.
Yet Durbin’s track record championing immigration reform and Chicago’s large, politically active immigrant community have made it a salient issue in Illinois for years. But it has taken on greater resonance since 2022, when Texas Governor Greg Abbott began sending tens of thousands of immigrants from the Mexican border to Chicago, overwhelming city services.
Last summer, the Trump administration surged federal immigration agents into the city and attempted to deploy the National Guard, a move that was blocked in federal district court.
In the chaotic, months-long operation, agents tear-gassed residential neighborhoods, arrested protesters and shot two people, including one fatally, Silverio Villegas Gonzalez, a father of two from Mexico. Pritzker, a possible 2028 presidential contender, called the surge an “occupation” and launched a commission to document agents’ alleged misconduct.
Stratton, who said her 10-year-old daughter’s Chicago school was twice placed on lockdown because of nearby ICE raids, joined her neighborhood’s rapid response group and marched with those protesting Trump’s policies.
“It’s not even about immigration. It’s to instill fear, and it’s a part of his authoritarian agenda,” Stratton said. She said congressional Democrats’ inability to check Trump’s immigration tactics should disqualify her opponents from a promotion to the Senate.
‘DISMANTLE AND REBUILD’
After federal immigration agents fatally shot U.S. citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, both Kelly and Krishnamoorthi voted against a bill to appropriate more money to Homeland Security, and backed Senate Democrats in forcing a partial department shutdown that has now lasted a month.
“You can’t wear masks. You have to have cameras on. You can’t just kidnap people off the street. You can’t just go to people’s homes without a warrant. We need to dismantle and rebuild,” Kelly said.
Krishnamoorthi, who was born in New Delhi and raised in Peoria, Illinois, has described his opposition to Trump’s immigration policy as personal. His outspokenness has made him a target.
After he was blocked by ICE agents from inspecting an immigration processing facility in suburban Chicago that became a venue for near-daily clashes between protesters and federal agents, a Florida city council member called for the mass deportation of Indian immigrants and called Krishnamoorthi a “foreign occupier.”
“I’m a racial, religious and ethnic minority and an immigrant with 29 letters in my name. I care deeply about making sure that nobody gets otherized, whoever they are, including immigrants. And I want immigrants to feel like this is home, that this is where they belong,” he said.
Stratton has criticized Krishnamoorthi’s campaign for accepting money from Republican donors, including Shyam Sankar, the chief technology officer of Palantir, a Homeland Security contractor. In January, the campaign said Krishnamoorthi had donated $29,300 in contributions Sankar had made since 2015 to immigrant advocacy groups in Illinois.
(Reporting by Emily Schmall; editing by Craig Timberg and David Gaffen)
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