Chicago-area Asians were arrested in Midway Blitz. They kept quiet about it, for a while.

There’s a common phrase in Urdu that Rabia Amin hates: "Log kya kahenge.”

The 27-year-old law clerk said it translates to “What will people say?”

When Amin’s father was picked up by federal immigration agents last September and detained for more than three months, it was a concern about “log kya kahenge” that led her family to tell loved ones a lie: that 63-year-old Asif Amin Cheema was sick.

“It honestly wasn't a hard thing to say because he has health issues,” Amin said, adding that Cheema suffers from diabetes, high blood pressure and vision problems.

As the family made calls to immigration officials and attorneys to get him released, while also trying to keep his sandwich shop afloat, they did not want to contend with any gossip in their community.

“When you’re dealing with so much, the last thing we need to worry about is having to defend our family name,” Amin said.

Besides, the family thought Cheema would be released soon. After all, he had applied for asylum and had no criminal record. So like many immigrants in the U.S., the Amin family never imagined Cheema would be picked up by federal immigration agents.

“We're hard working. We weren't criminals,” Amin said. “I came from a perspective that it could never happen to us.”

But then it did, just three minutes from his home in west suburban Addison.

“They just … saw that he was a brown man,” Amin said. “They arrest people and then ask questions later.”

The months that followed his arrest were harrowing. The family learned that Cheema had a removal order for a missed court date, something they say their former immigration lawyer did not tell them. And then, just as he was about to get deported, he collapsed at the airport and ended up in the hospital.

Fearing he might die, the Amin family decided to talk to news outlets.

On New Year’s Day, the family held a press conference. Cheema was deported to Pakistan that evening.

Lack of media coverage and a false sense of security

Amin’s father is one of more than 140 Asians in Illinois arrested during the second Trump administration, according to a WBEZ analysis of data obtained by the Deportation Data Project through a public records request. That makes up about 4% of all immigration-related arrests in Illinois. The majority of Asians arrested were from three countries: India, China and Kyrgyzstan.

The numbers only include arrests through Oct. 15, 2025, before the peak of Operation Midway Blitz.

Nationally, more than 8,000 Asian immigrants have been arrested since Trump returned to office. There have been numerous examples across the country of Asians — including American citizens and those with legal status — being arrested as part of Trump’s mass deportation campaign: a U.S. citizen of Hmong descent in Minnesota, South Korean workers at a car plant, a 6-year-old Chinese boy and his father who were in asylum proceedings.

Locally, leaders at various organizations serving Asian populations told WBEZ that over the past year, Chicago- area Asians have been picked up at routine immigration check-ins, at airports returning from a trip abroad, in front of homes and schools, outside grocery stores, and in rideshare lots near O’Hare International Airport.

But there wasn’t much media coverage about these incidents — despite the fact that Asians are the fastest growing racial demographic in the region. And while the Asian diaspora in Chicago includes dozens of ethnicities, in their experience of the past year with immigration enforcement, some common themes have emerged: Stigma and a false sense of security have often kept families from speaking publicly about arrests and detentions. But advocates say keeping quiet results in a lack of awareness and organizing around immigration enforcement in Asian communities.

Grace Pai, executive director of Asian Americans Advancing Justice Chicago, said the lack of news coverage around Asians affected by Trump’s deportation campaign is in part because “media tends to be interested in the human story, and so when there are not families that are willing to speak up, it's harder to get that coverage.”

Pai said fear, language barriers, and past experiences of political oppression in their native countries all contribute to families’ reticence to speak not just with the media but even within their own communities.

She added that there is also shame and stigma, a “hyperawareness of that public judgment or perception, especially because so many immigrant communities are very tight-knit.”

Pai and other leaders from organizations serving Indian, Chinese, Filipino, and Korean populations told WBEZ that, at the beginning of the second Trump administration, there was also a false sense of security.

“Early on there was a lot of skepticism about Know Your Rights trainings and flyers, " said Vân Huynh, executive director of the Vietnamese Association of Illinois. “People were like, 'No, no, we're not worried about it.' ”

Anita Puri, who leads the Indo American Center, an organization that serves the South Asian community, agreed: “There was this belief that, ‘Oh, it won't happen to me, I'm fine — I have proper documentation, or I've never had criminal activity.’ ”

But things have begun to shift in many Chicago-area Asian communities. Groups say residents and business owners have begun requesting more Know Your Rights trainings and legal workshops. Puri said her organization has hired a second attorney to help with immigration cases.

‘It’s so important that we coalesce’

Lisa Wright, director of government affairs and advocacy at the Chinese American Service League, says as videos and social media posts have spread through Asian communities, families are realizing the cost of not speaking up.

“You risk losing somebody you love, you risk access to information [and] access to resources that could really save your life or somebody's life,” said Wright, who is Taiwanese American and now carries a copy of her passport around.

She added that with the potential return of more federal immigration agents in the spring, it’s important for Asian organizations to band together to prepare for that next wave.

“Each ethnicity has an organization that represents them, and sometimes they can operate in their silos,” Wright said. “It's so important that we coalesce and build a coalition together.”

‘You don’t win by staying silent’

Building coalitions and speaking out were top of mind for Rabia Amin on a rainy night in January, as she packed supplies like diabetes test strips and a blood pressure monitor for her dad. In a pile on the family’s dining table, there were also cans of shaving gel, glaucoma medication, and new clothes. Cheema had lost more than 30 pounds while in detention and needed a new wardrobe.

Amin’s sister would fly out the next morning to help her dad get situated in a country he had not lived in for three decades.

As she organized the supplies, Amin thought back to last September.

“We tried to play nice, we tried to play fair, we tried to keep it quiet,” she said. “But you don't win [by] staying silent, and I think it hurts you more than anything.”

She wants Asians to speak up and band together not just with one another, but with all immigrant communities who are being targeted.

“It hasn't even been a year since this administration has been [back] in office,” Amin said. “If this is the amount of damage they've done in one year, I can't even imagine what they're gonna do for the next three.”

Contributing: Amy Qin