After weeks of saying Illinois’ Gov. J.B. Pritzker would need to ask for help from the National Guard before he would send troops to Chicago, President Donald Trump pivoted Tuesday saying he plans to send them “against Pritzker.”
Speaking on the White House lawn Tuesday morning, Trump said he plans to send troops to Chicago after Memphis, calling the Illinois city a “death trap.”
“So I’m going to go to Chicago early, against Pritzker. Pritzker is nothing,” Trump said. “If Pritzker was smart, he’d say please come in.”
Pritzker did not immediately respond to Trump’s comments but has been vocal in his opposition to a potential National Guard presence.
It marks the second time in two days Trump has mentioned sending the National Guard to Chicago and it comes just as he signed an executive order to send troops to Memphis.
Speaking in the Oval Office Monday, Trump said that his administration is committed to “doing Chicago probably next” to help combat crime.
“Chicago is a great city, and we’re going to make it great again very soon,” he said. “And I think we can do that, despite the tremendous size. I think we can do a real job.”
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Trump said his administration is committed to “saving our country from violent crime,” and also mentioned the possibility of sending the Guard to St. Louis, Baltimore and New Orleans, among other cities.
Trump’s message came on the same morning border patrol chief Greg Bovino said an “operation at large” had arrived in Chicago.
“Well, Chicago, we’ve arrived! Operation At Large is here to continue the mission we started in Los Angeles—to make the city safer by targeting and arresting criminal illegal aliens,” the post on X read.
Trump has insisted he has the authority to send the National Guard to Chicago despite a California court ruling he overstepped his authority in sending members to Los Angeles during protests and unrest there earlier this year.
He had indicated a desire to send the National Guard to Chicago, but later backtracked on the idea, saying that Pritzker and other officials would have to ask for such assistance.
“We could straighten out Chicago — all they have to do is ask us,” he told reporters. “I want to go into Chicago, and I have this incompetent governor who doesn’t want us.”
Pritzker said he has no plans of asking for such a deployment.
“He wants to set into the fact pattern that the governor called him to ask for help. Why? Because he’s going to end up in court,” Pritzker said. “He’s going to end up in court, and that will be a fact that they will use in court. That the governor called to ask for help, and I’m sorry I’m not going to provide him with evidence to support his desire to have the court rule in his favor. I’m just not going to do that.”