By rssfeeds-admin President Donald Trump and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker have traded barbs for more than five years, with tensions escalating from Twitter spats to constitutional showdowns over federal authority.
March 2020: Pandemic sparks first salvo
As COVID-19 cases surged across the U.S., Pritzker became one of the most vocal critics of the Trump administration’s response. On March 22, 2020, Pritzker appeared on CNN’s “State of the Union,” lamenting the lack of federal support for personal protective equipment (PPE).
“We’re competing against each other, we’re competing against other countries,” Pritzker said. “It’s a wide Wild West out there.”
Trump fired back hours later on Twitter:
“@JBPritzker, Governor of Illinois, and a very small group of certain other Governors… shouldn’t be blaming the Federal Government for their own shortcomings.”
Pritzker responded in a press briefing:
“This is the time for serious people, not the carnival barkers that are tweeting from the cheap seats. All I can say is get to work or get out of the way.”
April–July 2020: The ‘Hunger Games’ of PPE
As Illinois scrambled to secure medical supplies, Pritzker described the federal response as chaotic and transactional.
“In the midst of a global pandemic, states were forced to play some sort of sick Hunger Games game show to save the lives of our people,” Pritzker told Congress in July 2020.
Sen. Dick Durbin revealed that Pritzker had personally called airline CEOs to organize airlifts from China, saying the governor felt “like a shipping clerk.”
2025: The Feud reignites over immigration and federal troops
In Trump’s second term, tensions reignited as the president threatened to deploy National Guard troops to Chicago to combat crime and enforce immigration laws.
“Chicago’s a mess. You have an incompetent mayor. Grossly incompetent. And we’ll straighten that one out probably next,” Trump said in August 2025.
Pritzker responded: “Mr. President, do not come to Chicago. You are neither wanted here nor needed here,” he said. “It is illegal, it is unconstitutional, it is un-American.”
He later added: “If you hurt my people, nothing will stop me — not time or political circumstance — from making sure that you face justice under our constitutional rule of law.”
September 2025: Accusations of authoritarianism
After federal agents clashed with protesters and journalists in Chicago, Pritzker escalated his retort.
“In any other country,” the governor said, “if federal agents fired upon journalists and protesters when unprovoked, what would we call it? I don’t think we’d have any trouble calling it what it is: authoritarianism.”
Trump, meanwhile, continued to mock Pritzker’s leadership, calling him “probably the worst in the country” and “incompetent.” The president also called the governor a “disaster” and characterized Chicago as a “killing field” while threatening to send federal troops.
October 2024 – August 2025: Trump’s jabs at Pritzker’s weight intensify
Donald Trump first mocked Illinois Governor JB Pritzker’s weight during an October 2024 campaign rally in Ohio, joking that Pritzker was “too busy eating” to lead his state and adding, “He wants to eat all the time,” which drew laughter from the crowd.
The attacks escalated in August 2025, when Trump, speaking from the Oval Office, called Pritzker a “slob” and said he “ought to spend more time in the gym. The guy is a disaster”.
Trump also said of Pritzker, “I noticed he lost a little weight, so maybe he has a chance.”
He also called him a “slob”
Pritzker responded: “It takes one to know one on the weight question. The president himself is not in good shape.”
Pritzker added that Trump’s personal attacks were “just evidence of a guy who’s still living in fifth grade” and “commentary on himself”.
A Feud with national implications
Political analysts say the feud is more than personal—it’s symbolic of the broader clash between federal and state authority, and between two competing visions for America.
“This clash runs deeper than a short-term political spat,” wrote CNN’s Stephen Collinson. “It might develop into a full-blown crisis between a Republican White House and a major Democratic-run city and state.”
On Monday, Sept. 29, Pritzker, in response to Trump’s deployment of more than 100 ICE agents to Chicago, again let the president have it.
“It appears that Donald Trump not only has dementia set in, but he’s copying tactics of Vladimir Putin,” He during a press conference. “Sending troops into cities, thinking that that’s some sort of proving ground for war, or that indeed there’s some sort of internal war going on in the United States is just, frankly, insane and I’m concerned for his health.”
Pritzker suggested that 25th Amendment be invoked to remove Trump from office.
Meanwhile, Trump again called Pritzker a “loser,” blaming the governor for what he continues to call a crime problem in Chicago that can only be solved by sending in the National Guard.
With Pritzker rumored to be eyeing a 2028 presidential run, and Trump continuing to assert dominance over federal policy, the feud shows no signs of cooling.
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