Illinois Rep. Luis Gutierrez allegedly handcuffed at ICE office
Rep. Luis Gutierrez said he was handcuffed after refusing to leave ICE office.
-- A U.S. congressman said he was briefly handcuffed after refusing to leave a meeting at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Chicago.
Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., said he participated in a sit-in at the Chicago ICE headquarters after attending a meeting there.
"Federal police giving us our first warning that we risk arrest if we stay at Chicago ICE HQ," Gutierrez tweeted Monday.
"I was arrested, cuffed then cuffs were cut off. Waiting for further word on if/when we will be arrested," he said in a later tweet.
ICE did not immediately respond to ABC News' request for comment.
Gutierrez said he wanted the agency to rescind tweets perceived as a threat to the federal Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) policy, which makes allowances for some unauthorized immigrants who entered the United States as minors.
Its tweets led to an outcry from the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, of which Gutierrez is a member.
"President Trump and his people should keep their hands off of the Dreamers, period. Tweeting out that every DACA recipient is vulnerable to deportation is just another way this president is trying to create fear in immigrant communities, to make families and children think that their government could come after them at any time," Gutierrez said in a statement Friday in response to ICE's tweets. "It is disgusting behavior on the part of the Department of Homeland Security and the White House, and it needs to stop."
His sit-in comes amid controversy surrounding President Trump's immigration overhaul. Also, Trump has threatened to deport as many as 3 million immigrants with criminal records.