Pritzker Discusses Trump Policy
Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker used his Sunday appearance on NBC’s Meet the Press to unload on both Texas Governor Greg Abbott and President Donald Trump, accusing them of orchestrating a “mid-decade cheat” through redistricting ahead of the 2026 midterms.
According to Pritzker, the effort is a deliberate attempt to re-engineer Texas’s congressional map in a way that would hand Republicans extra seats and protect their grip on the U.S. House.
“They know that they’re going to lose in 2026,” he told host Kristen Welker. “So they’re trying to steal seats.” He credited Texas House Democrats for resisting the changes, even claiming the proposed map violated both the Voting Rights Act and the U.S. Constitution.
Pritzker went further, directly tying Abbott’s actions to Trump, whom he described as demanding “five more seats” from his allies. The Illinois Democrat argued that Trump’s motivations were rooted in political self-preservation after passing what Pritzker called a “big, ugly bill” that was “hyper unpopular” both in Texas and nationally.
“This is— it’s cheating,” Pritzker said, shifting from legislative criticism to personal attacks on Trump. “Donald Trump is a cheater. He cheats on his wives. He cheats at golf. And now he’s trying to cheat the American people out of their votes.”
The rhetoric mirrors talking points used recently by other high-profile Democrats, including California Governor Gavin Newsom and New York Governor Kathy Hochul, both of whom have also framed Republican-led redistricting efforts as attempts to “steal” elections.
That framing carries an implicit parallel to Trump’s own disputed claims about the 2020 election—casting the GOP as willing to bend electoral rules for partisan gain.
What Pritzker didn’t acknowledge is that similar accusations have been leveled against Democrats in states like New York and Illinois, where mid-decade redistricting schemes and gerrymandered maps have faced legal challenges and, in some cases, court-ordered rewrites.
In that context, his Sunday remarks serve as both a condemnation of Texas Republicans and a reinforcement of a broader partisan messaging war—one that paints the other side’s redistricting as “cheating” while defending, or sidestepping, his own party’s record.