Border Patrol’s Bovino to Be Deposed in Chicago Protest Suit (1)

Gregory Bovino, a US Customs and Border Protection chief patrol agent and the face of the Trump administration’s Chicago-area immigration crackdown, can be deposed in a lawsuit related to agents’ recent use of force against protesters and journalists, a federal judge ruled Monday.

Northern District of Illinois Judge Sara Ellis granted plaintiffs’ request for the deposition ahead of a preliminary injunction hearing in the case, but warned that attorneys must only ask questions about how they are enforcing the laws and handling protests—not the underlying justification for the immigration enforcement.

“What I really don’t want to get into, though, is the ‘why are you here’ broadly,” Ellis said. “It is not at all relevant that the administration is seeking to enforce the immigration laws in Chicago versus in Austin, Texas.”

Attorneys also will be allowed to depose former Immigration and Customs Enforcement Chicago Field Director Russell Hott, as well as CBP Deputy Chief Patrol Agent Daniel Parra.

The judge’s decision came during a lengthy hearing at which lower-level supervisors at ICE and Customs and Border Protection were questioned about their agents’ use of force in the Chicago area, where the “Operation Midway Blitz” crackdown has been ongoing since last month.

Protest Tactics

The underlying suit was filed by plaintiffs including Chicago-area journalism advocacy organizations, journalism union locals and protesters. They alleged federal agents’ tactics violated their rights, including by using pepper balls and tear gas at demonstrations.

The plaintiffs allege Bovino himself has inappropriately used force against local protesters, citing video of him stepping over a barrier to grab a demonstrator and bring him to the ground.

According to plaintiffs, Bovino told federal agents to keep “going hard” at protesters and said the “free speech” protest zone near an ICE facility in suburban Broadview was going to be a “free arrest zone.”

Ellis on Oct. 9 issued a temporary restraining order barring federal agents from using “riot-control” weapons on protesters and journalists unless they pose an immediate threat. She also required agents to give audible warnings before using riot-control devices. The order also requires agents to wear visible identification when on duty.

But after reports of tear-gassing and use of force after the order took effect, Ellis called the parties into court again last week and said she was extremely skeptical that the order was being followed. She later modified the order to add a requirement that federal agents activate their body-worn cameras, if they have them, during enforcement operations.

The Chicago area has for weeks seen significantly escalated immigration enforcement across the city and suburbs. Reports of an overnight military-style raid on a South Side apartment building and the detention of people including street vendors, rideshare drivers, and flea-market workers have roiled the city.

In response, protesters have repeatedly demonstrated at the Broadview facility, and neighbors have surrounded agents in sometimes-volatile impromptu protests when officers are spotted on the street.

In testimony Monday, Ellis asked CBP Deputy Incident Commander Kyle C. Harvick about two instances last week in which agents used tear gas on people in Chicago neighborhoods. It was necessary during chaotic moments that threatened agent safety, Harvick said, and from what he saw and was told, agents gave appropriate warnings before using it.

Ellis conducted the examination herself from the bench and did not question Harvick about witness accounts that seem to contradict some of his statements.

ICE Deputy Field Office Director Shawn Byers said that widely circulated accounts of agents pepper-spraying a minister don’t tell the whole story. The minister had been asked to leave government property repeatedly and didn’t comply, Byers said, saying he had viewed surveillance video of the incident.

From the bench, Ellis ordered surveillance footage from the Broadview facility as well as CBP agents’ body-worn camera footage preserved.

While Harvick said CBP agents are issued body-worn cameras, Byers said Chicago’s ICE field officers are not.

Notably, Byers and Harvick seemed to contradict each other about Bovino’s role in “Operation Midway Blitz.”

Byers described CBP and ICE as largely siloed from each other, with Bovino only in charge of the CBP side of things. Harvick, however, said from what he understood, Bovino was ultimately the overall head of Chicago enforcement operations.

“Operation Midway Blitz” shows no sign of slowing.

The Trump administration, in a separate case, has argued the demonstrations against agents have gotten so uncontrollable that federalized National Guard troops must deploy to maintain the peace—an argument that a Chicago district court judge as well as the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit both rejected. The administration has appealed to the US Supreme Court.

Plaintiffs are represented by Loevy & Loevy, Mandel Legal Aid Clinic, Protect Democracy Project, First Defense Legal Aid, Community Justice and Civil Rights Clinic at Northwestern Pritzker School of Law, and Roger Baldwin Foundation. Defendants are represented by the US Department of Justice.

The case is Chicago Headline Club v. Noem, N.D. Ill., No. 1:25-cv-12173, hearing 10/20/25.