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Code Switch

Unpacking the Trump administration's immigration raid in Chicago

Code Switch

NPR

Society & Culture

4.614.5K Ratings

🗓️ 25 October 2025

⏱️ 18 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

After midnight on September 30th, helicopters hovered above a large Chicago apartment building, and heavily armored agents rappelled from the choppers onto the roof. What unfolded became a spectacle that swept up both undocumented migrants and U.S. citizens alike. We’re looking at one of the most high-profile and aggressive raids in President Trump’s ongoing immigration crackdown —and what it means for other big cities that might be on the business end of operations like it.

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Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

New Zealand is undergoing a huge experiment to try to save its endangered wildlife by killing

0:06.5

animals that aren't native. And everyday New Zealanders are getting involved.

0:11.5

Though it is a bit gross sometimes, just thinking about it's a bit gross.

0:15.2

Flightless birds, sneaky predators, and high-tech traps. Listen now to the Sunday story

0:20.5

on the Up First podcast from NPR.

0:24.0

You're listening to Code Switch from NPR. I'm Gene Dumbie. And we're looking at one of the most

0:29.1

high profile and aggressive raids in President Trump's ongoing immigration crackdown.

0:35.1

And what that raid means for other big cities that might be on the

0:38.8

business end of operations like that. Okay, so a little after midnight on September 30th,

0:45.2

a surreal scene unfold on a Chicago south side. Military helicopters hovered above this

0:50.3

large apartment building and heavily armed and armored agents repelled from those choppers

0:56.2

onto the roof. There were flashbangs. Residents said that apartment doors were kicked down.

1:02.1

You're hearing sound of it right now from News Nation, whose journalists were there with those

1:07.3

federal agents. The neighbors nearby were woken up by all the commotion in this unusual raid to go after

1:14.4

undocumented immigrants.

1:16.1

One neighbor said later, that's how they came, like bin Laden was in their hiding or something.

1:21.4

People who lived in that building were zip tied.

1:24.7

Some were half dressed at the time.

1:27.2

Many of them were children. Some of the

1:29.8

people detained in the raid were U.S. citizens. But in the end, a few dozen people who lived there

1:36.0

were taken away.

1:40.6

My name's Myra Kwaja. I'm a journalist at the Invisible Institute, which is a nonprofit

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