Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker reacted with caution Wednesday to President Donald Trump’s comments that he planned to deploy National Guard troops to a city and state where they would be welcomed to deter crime, unlike Chicago where Pritzker and local officials have called a presidential troop mobilization unnecessary, illegal and unwarranted.
“I’m not convinced that we’re not going to see military troops on the ground,” Pritzker said. “We don’t know. I mean, I wish the president would again recognize that military troops in American cities are something that just doesn’t belong. And he should not be ordering them into American cities.”
Pritzker said sources connected to the Trump administration who have been providing him and his administration with information about a potential Guard deployment have been silent in recent days.
“They’re not calling us now, which I think is a good sign. It is a sign that they are not hearing things that are suspiciously like, ‘We’re going to see military troops coming,’” Pritzker said. “I’m not saying anything definitive other than I take it that the silence of the last day or two from those folks is an indication that maybe there’s some other place or other focus that the president is putting his attention.”
But Pritzker also said he expected federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement activities, under “Operation Midwest Blitz” that the Department of Homeland Security announced Monday, will intensify.
“They clearly have not gone out full force yet here with seemingly the number of people from ICE that they intended to have on the ground,” Pritzker said. “I haven’t seen all of those folks yet, but I anticipate that we will.”
Pritzker’s comments came a day after Trump, who has repeatedly made conflicting statements about his plans, said he would announce a National Guard deployment to a state and city that wants it, a declaration that appeared to at least temporarily take off the table his weekslong threat to use military forces in Chicago.
“We’re going to be announcing another city that we’re going to very shortly, working it out with the governor of a certain state who would love us to be there, and the mayor of a certain city in the same state that would love us to be there,” Trump told reporters Tuesday night as he touted results of his federalization of law enforcement and National Guard assets in Washington, D.C., by dining out at a restaurant.
For now, at least, Trump’s decision to hold off federalizing National Guard troops and sending them into Chicago represents a political victory for Pritzker, one of the president’s most vociferous opponents.
Throughout his back and forth with the president, the two-term governor has maintained that Chicago did not face an emergency that warranted military deployment, that such action was not wanted by the public and that such an act would be illegal.
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In an interview with NPR recorded before Trump’s comments Tuesday, Pritzker said it was difficult to read the Republican president’s on-and-off threats about sending the guard to Chicago.
“It’s almost like he’s bipolar because on one hand, he is attacking Chicago and announces that this is ‘Chipocalypse,’ and he wants to make it like ‘Apocalypse Now’ and attack our city. On the other hand, he says, ‘Well, maybe I’ll go somewhere else. Maybe we’ll go to Portland, or maybe we’ll go to New Orleans.’ So it’s really hard to tell what’s evolving at the White House,” said Pritzker, who is also a potential 2028 presidential aspirant.
Pritzker was referring to a Saturday posting Trump made on his “Truth Social” media platform, showing military helicopters flying over Chicago’s lakefront skyline with the title “Chipocalypse Now,” a reference to the 1979 Vietnam War movie “Apocalypse Now.” Trump was dressed in U.S. Army fatigues like the warped lieutenant colonel portrayed in the movie by actor Robert Duvall, who famously utters the line, “I love the smell of napalm in the morning.”
“I love the smell of deportations in the morning,” Trump wrote, before referring to his recent executive order calling for changing the name of the Department of Defense to the Department of War. “Chicago about to find out why it’s called the Department of WAR.”
Pritzker responded to Trump’s tweet by calling it “not normal,” and the president later denied he intended the meme to be interpreted as him wanting to go to war with Chicago, calling it “fake news.”
The three weeks Trump spent dangling the threat of military deployment over Chicago followed his June deployment of the National Guard and Marines to Los Angeles after sporadic protests against federal ICE activities there, as well as sending the Guard into Washington to deter crime.
One factor that may have chilled Trump moving on Chicago was a federal court ruling in San Francisco that found Trump’s military deployment in Los Angeles was illegal and violated the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878, which sharply restricts military use in domestic law enforcement activities.
Attorney General Pam Bondi, who was in the Chicago area Wednesday for a news conference announcing the seizure of unauthorized e-cigarette products, said Chicago should ask for Trump’s help but won’t.
“Chicago doesn’t want the president’s help,” Bondi said while in suburban Bensenville. “The president’s made it very clear he wants any major city in this country, any city — who they want his help — he wants to come in and help them.”
Like Trump did Tuesday night, Bondi telegraphed that a declaration would be made soon regarding Guard deployment.
“You’re going to hear an announcement very soon where we’re going next. But we want Chicago to ask us for the help, and they’re not going to do that, we understand,” she said.
Trump had previously discussed New Orleans and Portland, Oregon, as potential alternative National Guard deployment sites to Chicago. There also have been conversations between local, state and federal authorities about sending National Guard troops into Memphis, Tennessee, The Commercial Appeal reported.
On Tuesday, Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, a former Trump first-term White House press secretary, deployed 40 of the state’s National Guard to assist with ICE enforcement.
“Each day it seems like the president is deciding, you know, maybe you read something in the newspaper and he’ll send troops to Portland or perhaps in New Orleans or perhaps to Chicago, and so I’m always glad to know he’s not sending them to Chicago,” Pritzker said. “We don’t need them.”
In lieu of a National Guard deployment so far, Trump announced the “Midway Blitz” increased immigration enforcement, which so far has not resulted in a reported significant uptick in arrests.
Immigration advocates said Wednesday that there is an indication of heightened enforcement across the city and suburbs, but that it’s too early to tell how widespread arrests have been.
Calls to the emergency hotline at the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights have never been higher, said Brandon Lee, a spokesman for the group. Meanwhile, neighbors and allies have stepped up to patrol the streets to warn immigrants of the presence of agents. It will likely take time to determine how effective the latest effort has been, Lee said.
ICE did announce Wednesday that as part of its recent operations, it had arrested “several dangerous criminal illegal aliens” in Chicago, saying one was arrested “for aggravated sexual assault of a child family member,” while others had previously been convicted of an array of offenses, including rape, domestic battery and driving under the influence.
“These are the criminal illegal aliens Governor Pritzker, (Chicago) Mayor (Brandon) Johnson, and their fellow sanctuary politicians protect over the law-abiding American citizens,” Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement, referring to state of Illinois and city of Chicago sanctuary policies designed to protect immigrants. “President Trump and Secretary (Kristi) Noem have a clear message: no city is a safe haven for criminal illegal aliens.”
baiduhai’s Olivia Olander, Dan Petrella and Laura Rodríguez Presa contributed.