Mass Deportation: Illinois Governor dares Trump, vows to stop federal authorities from breaking state law
Illinois Democratic Governor J.B. Pritzker throws down the gauntlet to Donald Trump and vows to “stand in the way” if federal authorities try to break state law while carrying out his mass deportation raids.
His words: “Well, let me start by being clear that when we’re talking about violent criminals who’ve been convicted and are undocumented, we don’t want them in our state, we want them out of the country,” Pritzker said on CNN. “We hope they do get deported and if that’s who they’re picking up, we’re all for it.”
“They show up with a warrant and we’re going to hand over people who are in our prisons or in our jails who fit that description,” he added.
“Now, what they’re also doing though and it’s quite disturbing, is they’re going after people who are law-abiding, who are holding down jobs, who have families here, who may have been here for a decade or two decades,” said Pritzker.
“And they’re often our neighbors and our friends and why are we going after them? These are not people who are causing problems in our country and what we need is a path to citizenship for them,” he went on.
“We need to secure our border,” he continued. “We need to get rid of the violent criminals but we also need to protect people, at least the residents of Illinois and all across the nation who are just doing what we hope that immigrants will do.”
CNN’s Dana Bash then asked him about a Trump administration memo that alludes to prosecuting state officials who fail to comply with federal immigration authorities. He didn’t hesitate in responding.
“Dana we’re going to follow the law in Illinois and federal law too. We expect them to do the same,” said Pritzker. “I’m very afraid that they will not follow the law. The reason they put a memo out like that is– That’s already the law. Everybody, we have to follow federal law, we have to follow state law otherwise we’re potentially subject to prosecution. Of course we all know that.”
“They’re just putting that out because they want to threaten everybody,” he added. “They want people to step back and let them do whatever they want to do, the federal officials, and the reality is they can’t break the law.”
“You’re heard them talk about something unconstitutional this year, the removal of birthright citizenship,” he said. “We’re going to stand in the way of an unconstitutional order. We’ll also stand in the way of them breaking the law in Illinois if they’re not following federal law.”
“Now, we know that if they show up with warrants to take people away that we’re going to hand them over,” said Pritzker. “There are people that have deportation orders and have had for many years, even during the prior Trump administration, who need to be picked up and who are violent criminals and again should be deported.”
“So we’re going to do what we need to do but we also have a law on the books in Illinois that says our local law enforcement will stand up for those law-abiding undocumented people in our state who are doing the right thing,” he said. “And we’re not going to help federal officials just drag them away because somebody pointed at them and said ‘Oh that person’s brown or ‘That’s person’s not from here, check it out maybe they’re undocumented.”
He added that Illinois state officials simply will “not coordinate” with federal officials to help them arrest undocumented people who do not have warrants.
This is what the governor of every single blue state needs to do. They have real power to resist Trump and protect innocent people from his cruel, family-destroying policies. They have a moral responsibility to do so. History is watching.
