Chicago suspends online application website that allowed illegal immigrants to obtain IDs after ICE subpoena

Chicago city clerk Anna Valencia suspended the online application method of obtaining CityKey IDs after U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) sent a subpoena to her office for the information of applicants.

As the Trump administration continues its efforts to deport an unprecedented wave of illegal immigrants allowed to enter the country during the Biden administration, it faces resistance from local officials. Leaders of particularly Democratic-leaning cities like Chicago are some of the most outspoken about their efforts to protect illegal immigrants from being deported. 

Valencia announced Friday that her office would take the CityKey online portal offline, the Chicago Tribune reported. CityKeys are a local government-issued form of ID that is accessible to Chicago residents regardless of their immigration status, gender identity, or criminal history. Her decision to suspend the online application portal occurred after ICE subpoenaed her office for the information provided by noncitizens, in their mission to pursue illegal immigrants.

The Chicago Tribune noted that when the municipal ID program was first introduced in 2017, it was intended to skirt public records law and protect personal information by only processing applications in-person.

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However, as the migrant crisis spiked in the subsequent years, the city created an online portal to process applicants; documents that the office is not allowed to destroy under public records law.

Responding to advocates alarmed at the online retention of documents that could be used by ICE, Valencia paused that aspect of the program.

"We did hear, ‘Let’s pause the online platform temporarily as we take a pulse and evaluate what’s happening,'" Valencia told the Tribune. "We’re going to assess what’s happening daily and where the climate is, and if we feel we are in a different place, we can easily turn the online platform back on, but we are not going anywhere."

In May 2024, the City Council signed off on a new amendment to the municipal code that added, "Information provided by Applicants utilizing the online platform to obtain a City of Chicago ID will be stored."

"Listen, I’ve always been honest and transparent and led with integrity," Valencia told the Tribune, referencing online warnings about records retention. "I know there’s a lot of fear out there, so I want to be very clear that we’re going to fight giving over any data to the federal government… No data was given over to ICE, period, zero, for the CityKey."

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"I want to go back to the original problem, that if this Trump administration wasn’t overreaching for private people’s data, this would not even be a conversation," Valencia said. "This is Trump doing a witch hunt and intentionally trying to instill fear in people so that they can overtake our democracy."

The city says it does not have to comply with ICE's administrative subpoena, but if ICE comes back with a court order it could set off a legal battle.

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ICE and Valencia did not immediately respond to a request for further comment.