By Danaka Katovich
[Scott Olson, Getty Images]
On September thirtieth, in the midst of the night time, lots of of males wearing tactical army gear descended upon an condominium constructing in Chicago’s South Shore. Blackhawk helicopters had been circling above. The brokers threw flashbangs and started kicking down entrance doorways. When residents appeared out their home windows, they noticed these masked males holding weapons with lights fixed to them, pointed at their properties and shining into the home windows. Kids awoke to the flashbangs and the commotion. Together with their mother and father, they had been zip-tied and thrown outdoors. Each resident of the 130-unit constructing was separated by race and loaded into vehicles, the place they had been held for hours. Over thirty folks, together with youngsters, had been kidnapped, whereas the remainder of the residents had their zip ties minimize off and had been despatched again into their destroyed properties. Kids’s stuffed animals had been discovered within the dumpsters, mattresses had been overturned, and home windows had been smashed.
This seems like an incident from one of many United States’ many limitless wars around the globe, the place particular ops had been despatched to raid properties – leaving trauma and destruction of their wake. Chicagoans, particularly on the southside, aren’t any strangers to state violence and neglect, however this was a extra dramatic iteration that stole headlines everywhere in the nation.
When requested concerning the raid in South Shore, U.S. Chief Patrol Agent Gregory Bovino mentioned, “No rights have been violated right this moment” – a typical phrase turned by the identical folks with the facility to find out which “rights” we’re actually entitled to within the first place.
Across the similar time of this raid, Conde Nast voted Chicago the “Finest Massive Metropolis within the U.S.” for the ninth yr in a row. His award is being waved within the face of the Trump Administration in response to their assaults on the town – insinuating that crime and violence can’t be that unhealthy if the nation’s style makers prefer it right here a lot. However Chicago does have issues – and so they stream from the identical sources of energy that tout their assaults on immigrants and permit army helicopters to descend onto a neighborhood on the southside. An instance is the rising police budgets beneath Rahm Emanuel and the next closures of over 50 public faculties on the south and west sides of the town. Their “resolution” to our cities’ issues is the issue itself – however the those that run this nation know that properly as a result of their “resolution” to our “drawback” additionally occurs to be lining their pockets: unfettered Pentagon spending will increase at the price of disinvestment to the folks.
The South Shore neighborhood “had the very best variety of eviction filings in Chicago from 2015-2019.” Journalists reporting on the aftermath of the raid admitted they couldn’t inform how a lot of the injury had resulted from the raid, and the way a lot had been current earlier than. The constructing’s elevator didn’t work, and the stairwell smelled foul, the stench getting worse the additional that folks went inside.
There’s a 30-year distinction in life expectancy for Chicagoans between the north and south sides – folks in Streeterville common 90 years, however solely 60 years in Englewood.
Individuals dwelling in dilapidated buildings like these, whether or not in Chicago or elsewhere, who wrestle to pay hire and afford healthcare for his or her households should, sooner or later, ask themselves why they wrestle a lot in a rustic and metropolis that touts itself as doing so properly economically. Politicians dwelling comfortably in DC would really like poor US residents (and everybody else) responsible their struggles on their immigrant neighbors. Nevertheless, that doesn’t make a lot logical sense when everybody within the South Shore condominium, undocumented or not, was violently taken from their properties in the midst of the night time. These ICE raids clarify that the ruling class’s disdain goes far previous the immigrant group. It consists of anybody who lives alongside them, and anybody who dares to care about them – as we’ve seen protestors demanding transparency shot at and arrested on the Broadview detention facility.
Chicago stays one of the segregated cities within the U.S. Any funding in social welfare applications would profit the poorest in Chicago, who disproportionately are Black and Brown folks on the south and west sides of the town. Each minimize to social spending additionally disproportionately harms Black and Brown Chicagoans. Trump’s “Massive Stunning Invoice” kicked hundreds of Chicagoans off Medicaid and meals stamps and funneled that cash into ICE – the identical company terrorizing the southside now.
Mayor Brandon Johnson, who’s from and nonetheless resides on Chicago’s west facet, has articulated this level properly: Once we spend money on folks, crime goes down. Once we spend money on schooling, housing, psychological well being, and healthcare, our metropolis is best off. Investing additional into an ever-inflating police price range doesn’t cut back crime – it takes cash away from the applications that truly do. This isn’t simply rhetoric; it’s confirmed. Chicago’s crime charges hit a historic low this summer time – earlier than ICE began throwing smoke bombs at folks making an attempt to grocery store and taking pictures pepper bullets at pastors – that are additionally frequent scenes of Trump’s escapades in our metropolis.
The obsession with investing within the policing price range regionally is a trickle-down impact from the federal coverage of fixed funding within the Pentagon price range. It’s additionally a microcosm of intentionally misplaced priorities that hurt working-class folks everywhere in the nation. Our flesh pressers – Republicans and Democrats alike – have accepted rising the Pentagon price range yr after yr, to the purpose the place it’s nearing one trillion {dollars} yearly. Half of that cash goes to non-public contractors like Lockheed Martin and Boeing, and plenty of that cash seemingly goes lacking – the Pentagon has by no means handed an audit. Not coincidentally, the businesses that profit from the trillion-dollar army price range are additionally a few of the greatest spenders on lobbying and marketing campaign contributions to the exact same politicians who vote in favor of their authorities contracts yearly! 90% of Lockheed Martin’s income comes from authorities contractors, rendering their enterprise mannequin utterly not possible with out limitless warfare spending on behalf of the USA.
The ruling class’s message to the working poor is obvious: we’ve got cash for lots of weapons, however we’ve got no cash to your butter. If you find yourself homeless due to our greed, we’ll ship the army (paid for with cash we steal out of your taxes) to arrest and harass you. For those who’re a citizen, we’ll blame your situation on immigrants, however you’ll be thrown within the vehicles by males with weapons, too.
The people who find themselves struggling beneath disinvestment are those thought-about by the ruling class to be criminals – not the precise looters working the weapons industries who, with help from politicians, have formed our financial system solely round warfare and militarism.
It’s no shock {that a} nation that solely invests significantly in warfare would sic its army personnel by itself folks. They inform us it’s a treatment to crime, not as a result of they actually suppose so, however as a result of they wish to hold the warfare trade comfortable to allow them to keep in workplace, to allow them to get a board seat in the future, and so forth.
What occurred in Chicago is more likely to occur in every single place if we don’t cease it now. It’s the pure trajectory of the violent path the Trump Administration is ready on. Within the quick time period, solidarity and fast response groups to withstand the kidnapping of our neighbors are a very good first step. In a good society, folks wouldn’t have to face on corners and blow whistles to cease employees from being kidnapped by the state. If we don’t wish to reside in a rustic that enables militarized immigration officers and the army itself to occupy our cities and roam our streets, we’ve got to reckon with one thing lots larger: an financial system centered round warfare and violence, as an alternative of round folks. It’s elementary that we reject the notion that within the “richest nation within the historical past of the world,” we don’t have sufficient for folks to reside in dignity. It’s crucial that we embrace the values that can lead us to divest from warfare and policing and spend money on issues that truly serve the folks.
Danaka Katovich is CODEPINK’s Nationwide Co-Director. Danaka graduated from DePaul College with a bachelor’s diploma in Political Science in November 2020. Since 2018 she has been working in direction of ending US participation within the warfare in Yemen. At CODEPINK, she oversees all advocacy campaigns and facilitates our native organizing within the Midwest and in Europe. Her writing might be present in Jacobin, Salon, Truthout, CommonDreams, and extra.
