Reporting on site, Xander Felix Cardona, Staff Writer of the Independent
Alderperson and NEIU alum Jessie Fuentes was detained and handcuffed by federal agents inside the Humboldt Park Health’s emergency room on Friday, Oct. 3, 2025, after demanding a judicial warrant for a detained person. She was later released outside the emergency room.
This confrontation comes a day after an immigration raid in Humboldt Park, according to ABC7 Chicago.
Since the start of the Department of Homeland Security’s Operation Blitz in September 2025, arrests have been made throughout Chicago, including the Northwest side, where the Humboldt Park neighborhood is located.
Rapid Response of Alderperson Fuentes
The alderperson was alerted to a call from the leadership of Humboldt Park Health regarding Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in the emergency room and went on-site.
ICE agents brought a 37-year-old detained person into the emergency room after the person received an injury to the knee while running away from ICE, according to Fuentes.
Fuentes asked for a signed judicial warrant from the masked ICE agents in the emergency room for the detained person. According to doctors, the detained person will need surgery, either on-site or moved to a trauma center.
When the agents would not allow the detainee to speak with their attorney, Fuentes was placed in handcuffs for refusing to leave, as seen in an Instagram video posted by their office.
“You took an oath to protect this constitution. He has a constitutional right, sir,” Fuentes said in handcuffs to a Border Patrol agent. She was later released outside the Humboldt Park Health’s emergency room.
“He needs a lawyer.” Fuentes repeatedly said, after being released.
Emergency Press Conference
The Alderperson, along with other local officials, held an emergency press conference right outside the Humboldt Park Health facility. She described the incident as a common practice where individuals are being harmed in the process of being detained by federal agents.
As stated in Standard 4.3 of ICE National Detention Standards, “Every Facility shall directly or contractually provide its detainee population with the following:… Emergency care. The Health Services Administrator will negotiate and keep current arrangements with nearby medical facilities or health care providers to provide required health care not available within the facility.”
“ICE has been taking individuals into hospital rooms, into emergency rooms, because people are harmed while ICE is trying to detain people in the city of Chicago,” Fuentes said. “This is not the first incident, you all. What ICE is doing is exercising violence, physical violence, on the people of Chicago.”
In a press release shared on social media, the Alderperson’s office stated that the “Militarized immigration enforcement has occurred throughout Friday on the northwest side, and is currently ongoing in the area”.
After the confrontation, Alderperson Fuentes said, in an interview with the Independent, hours after her confrontation with the ICE agents:
- “Legislators on every legislative body need to continue to utilize every tool possible to make sure that we are strengthening our sanctuary and welcoming city status.”
- “We [should] protect institutions like schools, city colleges, universities and hospitals.”
- “More importantly, we need to continue to spread ‘Know Your Rights’ information, because individuals need to understand that they have the right to remain silent.”
“Now more than ever,” in a statement released by the 26th Ward’s Office, “we must stand together to keep families safe and ensure constitutional rights are upheld for everyone.”
For information about what to do if there is a sighting of ICE agents, here are some resources that can be accessed online.
- NEIU FAQ: If ICE Comes to Campus
- NEIU’s Undocumented Student Resources site
- Illinois’s State Attorney General’s Know Your Rights site
NEIU Student to Alderperson
Fuentes, an NEIU alum, has been a prominent member of the NEIU community during her time as a student, with her work as editor in chief of NEIU’s Que Ondee Sola, the Puerto Rican and Latina/o student magazine, and her help with the creation of the Angelina Pedroso Center for Diversity and Intercultural Affairs on the northside campus.
“In this moment, now more than ever, Black and Brown coalition is needed. And not a coalition on a cause. Because we will get through this migrant crisis…[we must] create a coalition over our own longevity,” as the spokesperson at an inaugural Homecoming event at the Pedroso Center in 2023.
Now Fuentes works “to serve as the Alderperson of the 26th Ward, bringing over a decade of experience in education, criminal justice reform, affordable housing, community development, and sustainability to give back to the community that shaped her”, according to the ‘Meet Alderperson Jessie Fuentes’ page.
