Crime & Law
Federal Immigration Agents Reportedly Spotted at 4 Cook County Courthouses Thursday
Community organizers hold signs during a press conference outside the Cook County Domestic Violence Courthouse on May 7, 2026 (WTTW News)
Federal agents were reportedly spotted at multiple Cook County courthouses Thursday morning in a move community activists are calling a “significant ramp up” of immigration enforcement in and around Chicago.
According to the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were confirmed at four Cook County courthouses today — the domestic violence courthouse downtown as well as other courts at 111th Street, Grand and Central, and in Maywood.
“ICE continues to conduct operations that violate due process, and by operating at courthouses in Cook County they are acting in violation of state law,” the ICIRR said in a statement.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, confirmed agents arrested one man, Rafal Porebski, a native of Poland, on a public sidewalk after he left the Grand and Central courthouse.
The agency said he’ll be held in ICE custody pending his deportation.
The spokesperson further stated that ICE targeting arrests at local courthouses is “common sense.”
“We aren’t some medieval kingdom,” the spokesperson said. “There are no legal sanctuaries where you can hide and avoid the consequences for breaking the law. Nothing in the constitution prohibits arresting a lawbreaker where you find them.”
Then-Cook County Chief Judge Timothy Evans signed an order last fall banning federal immigration agents from arresting people in or around local courthouses without a warrant. In December, Gov. JB Pritzker signed into law the Illinois Court Access, Safety, and Participation Act, which bars the civil arrest of anyone in or around courthouses who are attending certain court proceedings.
ICE, however, “doesn’t seem to care” about violating that law, Fred Tsao, the senior policy counsel at ICIRR, said Thursday.
“They are operating in open defiance of that law,” he said at a news conference. “So, we need to be ready.”
Kathryn Pelech, a supervisor with the Cook County Public Defender’s Office, said they have recorded federal arrests and appearances occurring at or near Cook County courthouses nearly every week since February.
According to Pelech, one person at the Harrison courthouse was arrested earlier this week by federal agents moments after the misdemeanor property damage charge they were in court to face was dismissed.
She said this puts many of her office’s clients into an “impossible situation” between showing up to court to defend themselves while risking an arrest for an alleged immigration violation.
“Having masked armed federal agents using our courthouses as hunting grounds without local support or coordination puts our courthouse staff and anyone using the courts … at risk of harm,” she said.
