In the wake of reports of federal immigration officers driving cars without proper license plates or modified plates, Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias has created a tipline to collect and investigate license plate violations, he said Wednesday.
The announcement comes two weeks after the Chicago Sun-Times sent his office evidence of Department of Homeland Security officers driving on public streets without one or both Illinois license plates and examples of individual license plates seen on multiple vehicles.
Giannoulias urged the public to call 312-814-1730 or email platewatch@ilsos.gov to report violations, including license plates that have been tampered with, obscured or swapped out as federal law enforcement officers have been sweeping Chicago-area streets and seizing people they believe are immigrants as part of a mass deportation campaign. Officers from both U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection have been in the area for more than a month.
In a video released on his Secretary of State YouTube channel, Giannoulias pointed to the words of a federal officer telling a bystander recording him, “You can record all you want. We change the plates out every day.”
“I have zero tolerance for this type of illegal activity,” Giannoulias said in the video. “We are investigating these allegations as we speak. Flipping license plates or altering them in any way to avoid detection is strictly prohibited in Illinois. Penalties include fines and potential jail time. Our office also has the authority to suspend or revoke the vehicle’s license plates, and no one — no one, including a federal agent — is above the law.”
His office also spelled out in a news release that vehicles registered in Illinois must display two license plates, front and rear.
Earlier this month, Giannoulias spokesperson Hannah Blatt told the Sun-Times that the enforcement of missing license plates was a “petty offense” that fell to local police to enforce with tickets up to $500.
She has since declined to say who owns specific vehicles used by federal officers. That includes four cars missing plates, two — a Ford and a Chevrolet — photographed by the Sun-Times at the federal immigration processing facility in west suburban Broadview with the same license plate and a vehicle whose lone rear Illinois plate had three of its digits blacked out.
Nor would Blatt comment on a Homeland Security spokesperson insisting, “To be clear: Our vehicles meet federal regulations for law enforcement.”
In response, Blatt on Oct. 10 wrote, “Appreciate you reaching out. Our office has provided you with all the information we can at this time.”
It’s still not clear whether Giannoulias’ office has taken any action on any of the vehicles that were flagged. When asked Wednesday, spokesperson Max Walczyk said he would check.
The federal agencies — ICE, CBP or DHS, which oversees them — did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Contributing: Mohammad Samra, Tyler Pasciak LaRiviere