As Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker awaited an anticipated surge of federal immigration enforcement agents into Chicago, he warned that President Donald Trump was embarking on a \u201cnefarious plan\u201d using fear and intimidation to normalize military activities in the nation\u2019s largest Democratic-led cities.<\/p>\n
But the two-term Democratic chief executive, who is seeking a third term and is a potential 2028 White House aspirant, acknowledged that absent the courts, he was powerless to combat Trump\u2019s efforts to detain immigrants through the work of hundreds of federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers coming to the city.<\/p>\n
Pritzker, speaking Friday on MSNBC\u2019s \u201cThe Briefing with Jen Psaki,\u201d also placed faith in community residents wielding cellphone cameras to help provide video evidence of legal violations that could occur in Chicago and be used in court by the state, as he continued to urge peaceful protests to prevent giving Trump a pretext for deploying the National Guard.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s, I believe, a nefarious plan,\u201d Pritzker said. \u201cIt\u2019s one that\u2019s been repeated over and over again by, well, tyrannical dictatorships across history, where you try to incite the local population into some mayhem by sending in police or other disruptors and then claim that there\u2019s too much mayhem on the ground and, therefore, there must be troops that are sent in. And, that\u2019s how you basically convert a democracy into something other than that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pritzker has said he thinks the timing of a surge in ICE enforcement in Chicago was tied to parades and celebrations of Mexican Independence Day, starting with Saturday\u2019s parade in Pilsen that is being conducted with tight security by organizers.<\/p>\n
Trump has repeatedly attacked Chicago as a \u201chellhole\u201d over crime, despite statistics showing violent crimes have been reduced in recent years.<\/p>\n
But using his June deployment of the National Guard and active-duty Marines to Los Angeles after a sporadic outbreak of anti-ICE protests and, more recently, the federalizing of law enforcement in Washington, D.C., Trump has sought for Republicans to claim a law-and-order political advantage against Democrats heading into next year\u2019s midterm elections.<\/p>\n
A federal court judge in San Francisco ruled on Tuesday that Trump\u2019s deployment of the military to Los Angeles, over the objections of Gov. Gavin Newsom, was unconstitutional. But an appellate court Thursday lifted the order, saying it needed more time to rule on the merits of the case.<\/p>\n
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