OPINION:
If the liberal media are to be believed, then Democrats have found their next president: J.B. Pritzker.
The Illinois governor certainly has the backing of James Carville, who would bet Kentucky Derby-size money on one of America’s worst governors.
Mr. Pritzker is already playing president, appearing on late-night talk shows and parroting the anti-Trump talking point du jour. The Democratic “front-runner” recently said U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement should be “wiped away” while unleashing daily X tirades about issues that have nothing to do with Illinois.
As an Illinois native, I know the Pritzker administration all too well — so much so that I’m running for governor of our state to undo his failures. Trust me, Americans do not want a failed leader such as Mr. Pritzker anywhere near the White House, and we don’t want to make America Illinois again.
The last time an Illinoisan received this much national attention, it was a young Barack Obama. We know how that went: Two presidential terms later, Americans became more divided than ever in recent memory, and they voiced their displeasure by electing President Trump. Twice.
Under Mr. Obama’s leadership, we saw an emergence of wokeness, a resurgence in racial tension and a nation divided by identity politics. Led by the Trump administration, this damage is still being undone.
America doesn’t need another media darling from Illinois (with half the charisma) as president, and the numbers don’t lie. Issue by issue, Mr. Pritzker is failing the Land of Lincoln.
On the economy, Mr. Pritzker has raised taxes dozens of times and driven state spending to record highs, only for economic growth to disappear. The Illinois budget has grown five times faster than the state’s economy, and the state is less affordable now than before Mr. Pritzker took office. It doesn’t help that he doubled state gas taxes and pegged annual increases to inflation, inflicting real pain at the pump.
People are fleeing Chicago, a symbol of violent crime, where community leaders are actually begging billionaires to come back and buy real estate. While Democrats cite “progress” on arrests and crime rates, prosecutors in the state are deliberately skewing statistics by knocking down felonies to less severe classifications ahead of the November midterms. Crime is so bad that we’re redefining “crime” itself.
People vote with their feet, and they are leaving Illinois for greener pastures. So many Illinoisans have fled the state that even mass illegal immigration can’t make up the difference. Carnegie Mellon University predicts that Illinois will actually lose two congressional seats, despite now being home to more than 500,000 illegal aliens. Blue states such as California, New York and Illinois have only one-party leadership to blame.
To the extent that states such as Illinois are showing progress on public safety, it’s because the Trump administration is deporting criminal illegal aliens. Since the launch of ICE’s Operation Midway Blitz, shootings, robberies and carjackings have all dropped by double digits, with no help from Mr. Pritzker. The Illinois governor has doubled down on the “sanctuary state,” refusing to cooperate with ICE and releasing more than 1,700 criminal illegal aliens.
It’s the same leftist playbook from my state to California, New York and the rest of blue America: Refuse to cooperate with ICE, support violent protesters and then blame the Trump administration for the “chaos.”
On the one side is woke lawlessness, and on the other is enforcing the actual law. I know where I stand: for the law and U.S. citizens.
For Mr. Pritzker to have the audacity to play president when he can’t even lead Illinois is a slap in the face to Illinoisans and all other Americans.
As the people in Chicago, Cook County and northern Illinois can attest, we don’t need another Illinois Democrat in the White House. What we need is to make Illinois, and the rest of America, great again.
• Rick Heidner is an entrepreneur and candidate for governor of Illinois.
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