President Trump posts on Truth Social that Chicago Mayor Johnson, Gov. Pritzker “should be in jail”
By Adam Harrington
In a Truth Social post on Wednesday, President Trump said Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker “should be in jail.”
“Chicago Mayor should be in jail for failing to protect Ice [U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement] Officers!” Mr. Trump posted. “Governor Pritzker also!”
Pritzker issued a statement on X in response to President Trump’s post.
“I will not back down. Trump is now calling for the arrest of elected representatives checking his power. What else is left on the path to full-blown authoritarianism?” Pritzker wrote.
Pritzker continued in a thread of X posts: “His masked agents already are grabbing people off the street. Separating children from their parents. Creating fear. Taking people for ‘how they look.’ Making people feel they need to carry citizenship papers. Invading our state with military troops. Sending in war helicopters in the middle of the night. Arresting elected officials asking questions.”
Mayor Johnson also posted to X.
“This is not the first time Trump has tried to have a Black man unjustly arrested,” he wrote. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Arrests, raids and protests have become daily occurrences as the presence of ICE in Chicago has drastically increased since the Department of Homeland Security launched what it dubbed “Operation Midway Blitz” at the beginning of September.
On Tuesday, Mayor Johnson signed an executive order prohibiting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal agencies from using city property for civil immigration enforcement.
The order prohibits federal authorities from using city-owned or controlled parking lots, vacant lots and garages as staging areas, processing locations or operations bases for civil immigration enforcement activity.
Meanwhile, Pritzker has taken Mr. Trump to task repeatedly for his use of federal forces, and most recently for deploying National Guard troops to Illinois. The deployment comes amid clashes between demonstrators and federal agents outside an ICE processing facility in Broadview, Illinois, where, within the past couple of weeks, over a dozen protesters were arrested.
On Tuesday night, Pritzker also denounced federal immigration enforcement in Chicago.
“It is striking fear in the hearts of everybody in Chicago, and we have residents — this isn’t just about undocumented people,” Pritzker said Tuesday night during a discussion in Minnesota with that state’s governor, Tim Walz. “U.S. citizens who are brown or Black are being stopped only for that reason, and asked for identification that proves they’re a U.S. citizen.”
Both governors said they believe the Trump administration is targeting blue states.
Pritzker is also calling for governors nationwide to denounce the National Guard deployments. In a statement on social media, he said Illinois could withdraw from the National Governors Association over the issue.
“If the National Governors Association chooses to remain silent, Illinois will have no choice but to withdraw from the organization,” Pritzker wrote. “We should be standing as one against the idea that Donald Trump can call up the National Guard against our will.”
The National Governors Association represents governors from all 50 states and across the political spectrum. California Gov. Gavin Newsom also made the same threat.
CBS News Chicago has reached out to both Mayor Johnson and Gov. Pritzker’s offices for further comment about Mr. Trump’s post.
