SPRINGFIELD — The Illinois House is poised this session to vote on legislation that would prohibit federal immigration detention centers from being built within 1,500 feet of schools, parks, homes and other community spaces — a direct response to the clashes that erupted in Chicago and the suburbs last year during the Trump administration’s mass deportation operations.

The bill, personally championed by House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch, cleared the House Executive Committee last week on an 8-3 party-line vote and could soon be before the full House. If it passes there, it will need approval from the Senate.

Welch, a Democrat from Hillside, pushed the measure after the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility in Broadview — which sits in his legislative district — became the scene of repeated confrontations between federal officers and protesters during President Donald Trump’s mass deportation missions known as Operation Midway Blitz.

“This is not an abstract policy debate for me. This is personal, and it is deeply local,” Welch testified Wednesday in the House Executive Committee before it passed. “The Broadview detention facility sits in the heart of the district that I represent, and during Operation Midway Blitz last year, the people who live in and around that community did not just witness aggressive federal activity.

“They lived through trauma. Families were terrified. Residents were shaken. Protesters were met with force. Communities already carrying enough pain were forced to relive fear right outside their homes, their parks, their churches and the places where children are supposed to feel safe.”

The bill would bar a federal immigration detention center from being “located, constructed, or operated within 1,500 feet of the property boundaries of any school, day care center, day care home, cemetery, public park, forest preserve, public housing, private residence, or place of religious worship, regardless of address.”

Welch also specified that the measure would not apply retroactively — meaning the existing Broadview ICE facility at 1930 Beach St. would not be affected.

But it could affect federal efforts to expand facilities for ICE or other immigration enforcement agencies, which former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem openly considered last year while discussing the possibility of expanding into other property near the ICE facility. Welch filed the bill in February, about four months after Noem’s comments. Earlier this month, Trump removed Noem from the DHS role, and last week, Oklahoma Republican U.S. Sen. Markwayne Mullin was sworn in her place.

Democrats have a supermajority in the Illinois House and Senate, so passage certainly seems possible. That means the biggest hurdle for the legislation might be legal.

During last week’s hearing, Republican state Rep. C.D. Davidsmeyer noted that the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which is located in San Francisco, and covers most of the western U.S., ruled that states cannot supersede the federal government by banning its use of private contractors to operate immigration detention centers.

Davidsmeyer, of Jacksonville, asked Welch if Illinois was “looking for a lawsuit” by passing his law.

“This is not the 9th (Circuit). We live in the 7th Circuit, and it’s very different than the 9th Circuit,” Welch responded. “This is Illinois. I wake up every day saying, ‘Thank God we live in Illinois.’ I don’t want a detention center in my community, and you shouldn’t want one either. But this is not a ban. This is saying they should not be built within 1,500 feet of these facilities.”

Broadview Mayor Katrina Thompson, who supports the bill, testified virtually at the committee hearing that the facility sits as close as 600 feet from some residents.

“Let me be clear that proximity matters,” Thompson said. “Where detention facilities are located has a direct impact on neighborhoods, on families, and (an) overall sense of safety and stability in a community.”

The tense and often violent confrontations outside the Broadview facility included questionable tactics by the federal officers with their use of tear gas and less-lethal munitions on demonstrators. It disrupted everyday life for a couple of months in the near west suburb, according to local officials. Earlier this month, federal prosecutors moved to drop charges against two of the six defendants in the politically charged “Broadview Six” case, in which a group of Democrats and other protesters were accused of conspiring to block and damage an immigration agent’s vehicle outside the ICE facility in September.

DHS didn’t answer direct questions from the Tribune seeking a reaction to Welch’s bill or whether the agency was still considering acquiring more property in the Chicago area after Noem’s departure.

Instead, an unnamed spokesperson for ICE issued a three-paragraph statement that repeated numerous Trump talking points chastising politicians, including Gov. JB Pritzker, for supporting sanctuary laws and stating their refusal to cooperate with ICE helped cause the deaths of individuals, including Loyola University Chicago student Sheridan Gorman, who officials say was killed by a Venezuelan national who had been in the U.S. without legal permission.