A left-leaning public radio station accused Cities 92.9 of reporting false information regarding a conversation between McLean county board member Corey Beirne, D-District 10, and McLean county Sheriff Matt Lane. After speaking with the sheriff and obtaining comments made by the federal border czar, key details appear to be missing from the local NPR station’s accusations and Beirne’s post about the conversation.
Cities 92.9 were the first to report claims made by Beirne on social media. In his official capacity Beirne stated, “I’ve spoken with Matt Lane, McLean County Sheriff and he’s assured me that the Sheriff’s department WILL NOT ASSIST ICE in conducting raids on local schools. I appreciate the conversation and assurance and look forward to continuing to work with Sheriff Lane and his team of professionals as we navigate this new challenge.”
A Cities 92.9 original Facebook post, which included the member’s full release, stated, “McLean county board member Corey Beirne claims McLean county sheriff Matt Lane will not be assisting federal authorities with deportation initiatives.”
ICE is a federal authority and Cities 92.9 referred to Beirne’s comment regarding “school raids,” as “deportation initiatives.” The word choice by Cities 92.9 was careful to not mislead the public in that school raids have not and will not be a part of the Trump Administration’s deportation operation.
Tom Homan, US border czar in charge of the mass deportation effort, at an ICE Command Center in Chicago with Dr. Phil was asked about school raids.
“Are you going into schools and arresting children at schools?” asked Phil.
“No,” said Homan.
“Is anything like that happening?” asked Phil.
“No sir,” said Homan.
Beirne did not include in his post that the sheriff, according to Lane, had also told him he doesn’t believe the federal government will conduct school raids. Lane clarified he was not on the “same page” with everything in Beirne’s original post.
“I think the federal government and law enforcement specifically in the federal realm is very good at assessing risk to everyone around when they’re doing something like this. So I don’t see that being a very good option [conducting school raids,]” said Lane. “It may be the only option in some cases, but I seriously doubt it’s going to happen.”
Contradicting Lane’s position Beirne stated, “Federal agencies generally lack the manpower and local knowledge to conduct raids on their own and rely on local law enforcement.”
Lane told Cities 92.9 on Monday, “I said we [the sheriff’s office] won’t be raiding schools for immigrant children. That’s what I told him, and that’s what he said. Now, anything else in the post [Beirne’s], I can’t verify.”
Lane confirmed just because the sheriff’s office won’t assist federal authorities with hypothetical school raids that doesn’t mean his office will stop ICE agents from entering the schools.
“I think what the federal government’s looking for, and I hope what they’re looking for, is the criminal element of the people that are here that shouldn’t be,” Lane told Cities. “One thing I think that it should be left up to immigration officials to do, is to go, if they want to go into schools, they can go into schools. I don’t believe that’s our place.”
Lane said right now there’s a little bit of conflict between the federal law and state law, the TRUST Act, in what the police can and can’t do in their cooperation with federal authorities.
“If, in fact, they’re [federal authorities] only going after the people that commit crimes other than coming through the border and being unchecked, if they’re after the criminal people that are in Chicago, then there may not be any change. But if it’s strictly deportation, I would like to see something come out of there [Chicago case law] that would clarify for all of Illinois law enforcement as far as what we can and cannot assist with,” said Lane.
Beirne in an official news release tagged several news outlets, not Cities 92.9.
“I would encourage and expect news outlets, or anyone seeking what my position is or isn’t on a particular subject, to go straight to the source and not draw their own conclusions,” Lane stated a few hours after Beirne’s official release.
Lane told Cities 92.9 he gave permission for Beirne to share details about their conversation but was not expecting Beirne to issue an official news release.
Beirne has not immediately responded to Cities 92.9’s request for comment.
Story by Cat Barker
