In his strongest public comments to date about his future political plans, Gov. JB Pritzker said Sunday he won’t rule out seeking the Democratic nomination for president in 2028 even while he seeks reelection to a third term as Illinois’ chief executive next year.
Pritzker, appearing on NBC’s “Meet The Press,” also contended that a Republican-backed remap of Texas’ congressional districts — which sent more than 30 of that state’s House Democrats to Illinois to block the move — would be “unconstitutional” for violating federal voting protections for racial and ethnic voters.
Pritzker, who announced his bid for a third term as governor in June, has not explicitly said he is seeking the presidency. But he has had several speaking engagements in front of Democrats across the country, along with frequent national TV and podcast appearances. His role in hosting Texas House Democrats attempting to block the GOP remap has also raised his profile.
Asked by Meet the Press moderator Kristen Welker if he would rule out a presidential bid, Pritzker said, “I can’t rule anything out.”
“But what I can rule in is that no matter what decisions I make, and I mean, in particular about what I do here in the state of Illinois, is about the people of Illinois. Indeed, any future decisions of mine will always be guided by that,” the Democratic governor said. “I’m focused on running for reelection as governor of the state of Illinois, and everything that I do really is focused on lifting up the people of my state.”
Illinois Republicans have routinely seized on Pritzker’s presidential aspirations, accusing him of putting his political ambitions ahead of the more parochial concerns of the state’s voters. But more than a month after Pritzker announced his bid for a rare third term, the state GOP has so far failed to field a big-name challenger to the billionaire Democratic governor or any of the other statewide Democratic officeholders ahead of their marquee event of Republican Day at the Illinois State Fair this week.
Pritzker also during the Sunday morning program defended Illinois’ heavily gerrymandered congressional map, which gave Democrats a 14-3 advantage in the state’s U.S. House delegation. Pritzker noted that the map was done as part of the typical, post-federal census cycle of remapping rather than what Texas Republicans are attempting to do, which is redraw that state’s congressional map mid-decade. Pritzker also said the Illinois map met federal voting rights requirements.
“Don’t forget, the map that they put together, it violates the Voting Rights Act, and it violates the Constitution,” said of the efforts, which are being spearheaded by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and were encouraged by President Donald Trump to try to flip five seats now held by Democrats to Republicans to protect the GOP’s narrow U.S. House majority in the midterm through the end of Trump’s second term.
“Gov. Abbott is the joke. He’s the one who is attempting mid-decade here, at a time when frankly all of us are concerned about the future of democracy, he’s literally helping whittle it away and licking the boots of his leader, Donald Trump,” Pritzker said.
“He’s attempting to thwart federal law and take away five seats that are in the hands of Black, brown, minority Congresspeople and the people that they represent. He’s taking those votes away. He’s violating the Constitution,” he said. “And all of us need to stand up and speak out and make sure that it’s understood across the country that what they’re trying to do in Texas is illegal.”
Sunday marked one week since Texas House Democrats fled the state to Illinois and other northern states to prevent the GOP-led House chamber in Texas from having a quorum to conduct legislative business, including passing the new congressional map. The special legislative session House Democrats are boycotting is scheduled to end Aug. 19.
“The Texas Democrats that are here are welcome,” he said of a group of more than 30, who have been staying in west suburban St. Charles. “We’re providing them a safe haven, a place for them to visit and stay, breaking quorum, because they’re heroes that are standing up not just for their own constituents and for the people of Texas and their rights but also for the rights of people all across the country.”
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As a candidate for governor, Pritzker voiced support for the independent drawing of congressional and legislative boundaries and vowed to veto any map that is “drafted or created by legislators, political party leaders and or their staffs or allies.” But he signed the post-2020 census maps drawn up by Democratic legislative leaders and has said lawmakers failed to take steps to enact an independent mapmaking system.
On Facebook on Sunday, Pritzker threw the issue of congressional mapmaking to Congress.
“Donald Trump and Republicans are pushing illegal maps that violate the Voting Rights Act,” the governor wrote. “Instead, Congress should pass fair, independent maps nationwide. Without that, Democratic states must consider all the options to protect our constitutional republic.”
On Fox News Sunday, Abbott, the Texas governor, said the legislative stalemate “could literally last years.”
“I’m authorized to call a special session every 30 days. It lasts 30 days, and as soon as this one is over, I’m going to call another one, then another one, then another one, then another one,” Abbott said. “If they show back up in the state of Texas, they will be arrested and taken to the Capitol. If they want to evade that arrest, they’re going to stay outside of the state of Texas for literally years, and they might as well just start voting in California or voting in Illinois, wherever they may be.”
Though the Texas Supreme Court has said quorum-breaking is part of the state’s constitution, Abbott has asked the state’s highest court to declare the seats of House Democrats as “abandoned” and allow him to fill the vacancies.
Abbott belittled the efforts of Democratic governors, like California’s Gavin Newsom and New York’s Kathy Hochul, who have vowed to remap their states’ congressional boundaries to counter actions by Texas.
“The fact of the matter is, they are bringing a gun to a gunfight, but they have no bullets because they lost their bullets when they engaged in redistricting, in gerrymandering, over the past decade,” he said. “They’ve run out of Republicans that they can move out of office. If Texas had drawn our lines mathematically the same way that California had, we would be not adding five more seats. We would be adding 10 more seats.”
Abbott also sought to dispel concerns about federal Voting Rights Act violations in the proposed GOP map, saying of the five seats being redrawn, “four of the new seats will be predominantly Hispanic.”
“The problem that Democrats have in the state of Texas is Hispanics, Black voters and other voters. They have learned now that the ideas that Democrats stand for are contrary to the ideas that the Hispanic community and black community stand for,” he said.
Meanwhile, the ranking Democratic members of the U.S. House Judiciary and Oversight committees have asked Attorney General Pam Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel to provide them with information about any efforts by the FBI to locate the absent Texas House Democrats.
“We write with great concern about the abuse of federal public safety resources for completely political purposes and without a law enforcement rationale that is reportedly taking place right now,” U.S. Reps. Robert Garcia of California, who sits on the oversight panel, and Jamie Raskin of Maryland, who sits on the judiciary committee, wrote in their joint letter.
“Given the FBI’s crucial role as a federal law enforcement agency, it is essential that its actions be guided by clear legal authority, political neutrality, and an appropriate respect for the autonomy of state legislatures and their members,” they wrote. “The involvement of federal agents in a state-level political dispute raises serious questions about potential overreach and misuse of federal power.”
The Democrats’ letter was in response to Texas Republican U.S. Sen. John Cornyn’s announcement that the FBI had accepted his request to find the Texas Democratic lawmakers, even though the legislators have not been charged with any state or federal criminal act.
The Democratic congressmen were joined in the request by Texas Democratic U.S. Reps. Greg Casar and Jasmine Crockett. They also sought details of any FBI involvement and any communications between Texas officials and the FBI and the Department of Justice.
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