On Friday, Rev. Michael Woolf was among 21 people arrested during a protest outside a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, facility in Broadview, Illinois, outside Chicago.
Video of the arrest shows a group of officers dragging Woolf to the ground and digging their knees into his body before detaining him. Woolf, a pastor at Evanston’s Lake Street Church, was later released after seven hours in custody.
On Sunday, Woolf spoke with the co-hosts of “The Weekend: Primetime” to discuss why he and other faith leaders were protesting outside that facility, as well as the “crisis” of Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown in cities like Chicago.
“We were there to raise our voices against what’s happening in that facility, because we know what’s happening in that facility is pretty much tantamount to torture,” Woolf said. “It’s denial of food, it’s unsanitary conditions, and the people who are detained there are detained without any spiritual care whatsoever.”
Woolf said Friday was not his first day protesting in front of the Broadview facility, which has been criticized for its inhumane conditions.
During previous demonstrations, the pastor said he’s made an effort to speak with officers and remind them that they are “moral actors” who have “choices to make.”
“They’re protecting what amounts to a concentration camp behind them, and they’re allowing it to happen,” he said. “But they have a choice on how they’re going to operate with that.”
“I’ve seen, and sometimes made, some police officers cry before,” Woolf recalled. “When you talk about the children who are abducted, police officers are human beings. I don’t agree with some of the tactics used at Broadview. I don’t agree with them protecting ICE or protecting this facility, but they’re human beings. They’re capable of conversion and change, and that is really important to note.”
Woolf said that the U.S. is confronting an “intense crisis of morality” due to Trump’s immigration policies, one that “demands people of conscience to be able to say something about it.”
“I think that we absolutely know what is happening in this country,” he said. “We can see it with our eyes. It’s verifiable. We can’t deny it. And so that demands a response.”
“When you have folks coming into communities and kidnapping our neighbors, when you have people who operate with absolute impunity, when you have an authoritarianism that is on the rise, and when you’re dealing with tyranny — it’s an emergency,” Woolf said. “And it demands all aspects of society.”
You can watch Woolf’s full interview in the clip at the top of the page.
