Chicago-area law enforcement officers took part in an undercover probe by Immigration and Customs Enforcement into Minneapolis mutual aid networks last spring as part of the feds’ conspiracy investigation into 15 Twin Cities activists facing federal felony charges for resisting Operation Metro Surge, according to newly released documents reviewed by WIRED.

An April report by ICE’s investigations wing, Homeland Security Investigations, titled “Antifa Roadshow,” details in-person and electronic surveillance by a joint task force of an April 2 talk. The task force was made up of 14 law enforcement officers—six local cops and eight HSI Chicago agents. The talk included self-described anarchists in Minnesota who spoke about their organizing experiences during the three-month immigration surge, which resulted in the killings of two US citizens.

The document, released by the 15 Minnesota activists’ defense team as part of the ongoing federal case against them, exposes close cooperation between local police, sheriffs, and HSI agents on a prosecution that critics say crosses the line into political repression. The Chicago HSI task force, which included officers from Chicago, Aurora, Downer’s Grove, Cook County, and Kane County, used two undercover agents, unspecified electronic surveillance, audio recordings, license-plate-reader data, and surveillance cameras from Chicago’s sprawling CCTV network to identify the April 2 event’s attendees and build connections to other anti-ICE protests in Illinois and other states.

Records produced by the Kane County Sheriff’s office show the unit in question is the Chicago-area Homeland Security Investigations Task Force. Local cops who join the unit are accepted on either a full- or part-time basis for two years, with the sign-off of their superiors.

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