Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker's Warning
Pritzker Compares Trump Administration’s Approach to Nazi Germany During State Budget Address
Amanda Vinicky | February 19, 2025, 9:03 pm.
As Democrats smarting from the 2024 election construct how they’ll combat President Donald Trump’s agenda, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker is clear on his approach, straddling attack dog and whistleblower.
In perhaps his most strident remarks against Trump, Pritzker used the stage of his joint budget and state of the state address on Wednesday not only to warn about problems the state could face should federal cuts to spending and programs decimate the budget, but also to issue an unsparing warning that what’s happening in America now shares similarities with Adolf Hitler’s rise in Germany.
It provoked an instant backlash from Republicans, who said his speech was divisive and inflammatory for comparing Republicans aligned with Trump to Nazis.
Pritzker said in his address that he didn’t “invoke the specter of Nazis lightly,” but as a Jewish man who became intimately familiar with stories of concentration camp survivors as he helped to build the Holocaust Museum in Skokie, he is “watching with a foreboding dread what is happening in our country right now.”
“Here’s what I’ve learned — the root that tears apart your house’s foundation begins as a seed — a seed of distrust and hate and blame,” Pritzker said. “The seed that grew into a dictatorship in Europe a lifetime ago didn’t arrive overnight. It started with everyday Germans mad about inflation and looking for someone to blame.”
Pritzker said with Trump blaming the late January plane crash in Washington, D.C., on diversity hiring, the “authoritarian playbook is laid bare.”
“We don’t have kings in America, and I don’t intend to bend the knee to one,” Pritzker said to applause from Democrats. “If we don’t want to repeat history, then for God’s sake, in this moment, we better be strong enough to learn from it.”
Pritzker, who has not said whether he will run for a third term as governor but who has done nothing to shoot down presidential aspirations, said he was speaking not out of “ambition” but obligation.
"If you think I’m overreacting and sound the alarm too soon, consider this: It took the Nazis one month, three weeks, two days, eight hours and 40 minutes to dismantle a constitutional republic,” Pritzker said. “All I’m saying is that when the five-alarm fire starts to burn, every good person better be ready to man a post with a bucket of water if you want to stop it from getting out of control. Tyranny requires your fear and your silence and your compliance. Democracy requires your courage. So gather your justice and humanity, Illinois, and do not let the tragic spirit of despair overcome us when our country needs us the most.”
Amanda Vinicky | February 19, 2025, 9:03 pm.
As Democrats smarting from the 2024 election construct how they’ll combat President Donald Trump’s agenda, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker is clear on his approach, straddling attack dog and whistleblower.
In perhaps his most strident remarks against Trump, Pritzker used the stage of his joint budget and state of the state address on Wednesday not only to warn about problems the state could face should federal cuts to spending and programs decimate the budget, but also to issue an unsparing warning that what’s happening in America now shares similarities with Adolf Hitler’s rise in Germany.
It provoked an instant backlash from Republicans, who said his speech was divisive and inflammatory for comparing Republicans aligned with Trump to Nazis.
Pritzker said in his address that he didn’t “invoke the specter of Nazis lightly,” but as a Jewish man who became intimately familiar with stories of concentration camp survivors as he helped to build the Holocaust Museum in Skokie, he is “watching with a foreboding dread what is happening in our country right now.”
“Here’s what I’ve learned — the root that tears apart your house’s foundation begins as a seed — a seed of distrust and hate and blame,” Pritzker said. “The seed that grew into a dictatorship in Europe a lifetime ago didn’t arrive overnight. It started with everyday Germans mad about inflation and looking for someone to blame.”
Pritzker said with Trump blaming the late January plane crash in Washington, D.C., on diversity hiring, the “authoritarian playbook is laid bare.”
“We don’t have kings in America, and I don’t intend to bend the knee to one,” Pritzker said to applause from Democrats. “If we don’t want to repeat history, then for God’s sake, in this moment, we better be strong enough to learn from it.”
Pritzker, who has not said whether he will run for a third term as governor but who has done nothing to shoot down presidential aspirations, said he was speaking not out of “ambition” but obligation.
"If you think I’m overreacting and sound the alarm too soon, consider this: It took the Nazis one month, three weeks, two days, eight hours and 40 minutes to dismantle a constitutional republic,” Pritzker said. “All I’m saying is that when the five-alarm fire starts to burn, every good person better be ready to man a post with a bucket of water if you want to stop it from getting out of control. Tyranny requires your fear and your silence and your compliance. Democracy requires your courage. So gather your justice and humanity, Illinois, and do not let the tragic spirit of despair overcome us when our country needs us the most.”
