* From a transcript provided by the governor’s office of Gov. JB Pritzker’s interview with MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski. Videos are here…
Brzezinski: The law’s being broken in your city with these ICE raids, yes?
Governor Pritzker: It appears to me that ICE is breaking what is a norm […] and we are watching to see that they are whether they are breaking laws. I can give you what I have told people to do in this moment is pull out your iPhone, pull out your Android phone, film everything that you see, because it’s clear to me that they are operating in an unnatural way, in a way that ought to be, they ought to be held accountable for. And indeed, we’ve seen that the way that they’re handling protesters in front of the Broadview ICE facility is a way that honestly, I don’t think Americans approve of, and I think you’re seeing that in the polling data, where Donald Trump used to be very popular on the issue of immigration is now becoming unpopular.
Brzezinski: And you don’t see any laws though, right now that are being specifically broken?
Governor Pritzker: Listen, we will prosecute. We will prosecute if the laws are broken, and we need information about the killing that took place on the streets of Chicago by ICE when somebody was driving their car. An ICE agent was injured and was in the hospital, and we don’t know all the circumstances because ICE won’t give it to us. And what has Donald Trump done, by the way? Got rid of all of the investigators for these very things, these independent counsels that usually will investigate these. Now they don’t exist because Donald Trump has done away with them.
Brzezinski: What do you do?
Governor Pritzker: We’re doing everything that we can. We’re giving people, we’re making sure that everybody knows their rights, so they know what they’re subject to, what they’re allowed to be subject to, what the laws of the United States say. Number two, we’re asking everybody to speak up, show up, and protest. And third, film, everything you see, because in the end, we’re going to win this because the average folks on the streets of the United States will not put up with what Donald Trump has done to the Constitution.
- jolietj - Wednesday, Sep 24, 25 @ 9:15 am:
Prices are going to continue to rise. For the prez to say he wants lower interest rates; and then turnaround and implement tariffs and immigration raids on roofers/food facilities etc. it’s like he doesn’t understand economics at all.
- RNUG - Wednesday, Sep 24, 25 @ 9:19 am:
Lot of words to say we don’t think we have legal grounds to stop them so let’s wage a public relations campaign.
- low level - Wednesday, Sep 24, 25 @ 9:27 am:
==it’s like he doesn’t understand economics at all.==
He doesn’t. Milton Friedman would be appalled.
- Anyone Remember - Wednesday, Sep 24, 25 @ 9:42 am:
===He doesn’t. Milton Friedman would be appalled.===
As would Friedrich von Hayek. And Ayn Rand.
- Socially DIstant Watcher - Wednesday, Sep 24, 25 @ 9:54 am:
@RNUG: this conversation is in the public arena. If there were a legal basis, it would shift to a legal arena. The legal issues are complex but that doesn’t mean it won’t get there.
- Pundent - Wednesday, Sep 24, 25 @ 10:32 am:
=Lot of words to say we don’t think we have legal grounds to stop them so let’s wage a public relations campaign.=
Maybe it’s legal for ICE to wear masks and rough people up who get in their way. Maybe they aren’t breaking the law when they go into neighborhoods and chase legal immigrants off rooftops and down the street terrifying both the workers and residents. Or maybe it isn’t and the courts will tell the administration down the road “you can’t do that.” And maybe they’ll listen and maybe they won’t. And by the time that does happen we’ll likely be focused on the next manufactured crisis. Because that’s the hallmark of this administration.
But is that really want we want?
- Mason County - Wednesday, Sep 24, 25 @ 10:41 am:
=@RNUG: this conversation is in the public arena. If there were a legal basis, it would shift to a legal arena.=
RNUG is correct. And in case anyone has not noticed this complex issue has already shifted to the ‘legal arena.’
- localgovhero - Wednesday, Sep 24, 25 @ 11:29 am:
I think that it is apparent that JB does not want to outright defy the federal government.