Gov. JB Pritzker told a conference of Black activists in New York City on Thursday that “all of us need to be civil rights advocates” and protect voting rights, saying he thinks President Donald Trump plans to call out federal immigration agents to polling places for the November midterms and “we need to go with purpose and push them out of the way.”
“If we don’t have a fair election in November, we won’t have any more elections,” Pritzker told the Rev. Al Sharpton at Sharpton’s annual National Action Network conference in New York. “They’re taking away our voting rights. They’re taking away your voting rights and we have to fight like hell to preserve those rights. So many people lost their lives doing it.”
In February, the White House said Trump had not discussed any plans to deploy federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement or Customs and Border Protection agents to polling places.
But close Trump ally Steve Bannon has repeatedly pushed for their deployment and last month called the recent use of ICE agents at the nation’s airports during a stalemate over funding the Transportation Security Agency a “test run” for “ICE’s involvement in the 2026 midterms.”
Bannon’s comments came the same day as Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin was confirmed to lead the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE and CBP. During his Senate confirmation hearing, Mullin said ICE agents could be sent to polling places if a “specific threat” existed.
Trump, Pritzker told the conference, is “going to try to call out ICE and CBP and scare people away from the polls, everybody. He’s going to make it seem like you shouldn’t vote. We need to go with purpose and push them out of the way or at least tell them to get out of the way and go in and vote. And all of us as governors need to protect your right to vote.”
Pritzker’s call for physical confrontation with federal agents could resurrect frequent GOP criticisms that the state’s two-term Democratic governor’s rhetoric is inciting violence, such as in April of last year when he told New Hampshire Democrats that Republicans shouldn’t “know a moment of peace.” Pritzker called the criticism “ridiculous.”
As he seeks a third term as Illinois chief executive, Pritzker is also pondering a 2028 White House bid, and Sharpton’s annual conference is providing an early cattle call for several possible Democrats, including Govs. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, Wes Moore of Maryland, Andy Beshear of Kentucky, former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Rep. Ro Khanna of California, and Arizona Sens. Mark Kelly and Ruben Gallego, and former vice president and 2024 presidential nominee Kamala Harris. California Gov. Gavin Newsom, another potential candidate, did not attend due to a previously scheduled family commitment.
Asked directly by Sharpton whether he was a 2028 presidential candidate, Pritzker gave his usual answer that he’s seeking a third term as governor and that any decision about his future would be based on what he felt was best for the people of Illinois. But, he said, “since I was an adult and able to vote, I’ve been involved in some fashion or another” in presidential politics, “and I’m going to be more involved than ever before in 2028 because we can’t lose.”
“Look, we have a pretty good bench,” Pritzker said of his potential Democratic presidential rivals. “I don’t know what I’ll be doing after I hope I win reelection, but I can tell you this: I’m going to fight like hell to elect a Democrat in 2028.”
Pritzker said Trump’s deployment of federal agents in Chicago
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and Minnesota “wasn’t really about deportation. It wasn’t really about immigration.”“It’s this whole administration’s view about people of color. Evidence of that, I might add, is just look at his Cabinet. He has one Black person in the entire Cabinet of the United States,” Pritzker said, referring to Scott Turner, the secretary of Housing and Urban Development.
Pritzker said Democrats campaigning for the midterm elections and for the presidency in 2028 should focus on “livability,” repackaging the oft-used term “affordability” to speak to people about the need to raise the federal minimum wage and bring down the costs of housing and health care.
“The one thing that we should take away and learn from what Donald Trump has done: He came into office with an agenda and he essentially has invoked and gotten passed almost all of his agenda in a year. We need to have an agenda and we need to make sure we pass it in a first year of a Democratic administration. And, it needs to be bold, and it needs to include the restoration of voting rights,” Pritzker said.
“Voting is perhaps the most important thing that we’ve got to expand the rights of,” he said. “But the agenda, and I’ll call it Agenda 48 because the 48th president of the United States, who’s going to be a Democrat, has got to have an agenda that’s bold and gets passed right away.”