WASHINGTON, D.C. – As Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker prepares to testify before a Congressional committee on Thursday morning, he’ll face questions about the state’s TRUST Act.

The controversial law limits the degree to which local police can cooperate with federal immigration enforcement.

The backstory:

In 2017, Illinois enacted the TRUST Act under Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner.

The law bans local police from complying with federal requests to detain or arrest a person in the country illegally, unless ordered by a judge.

Local law enforcement also cannot stop, search, or arrest anyone based solely on their immigration or citizenship status.

In 2021, the state legislature passed laws expanding protections for immigrants in Illinois.

Mark Fleming of the National Immigrant Justice Center helped craft the bill and said the point is to keep immigration enforcement in the hands of federal agents.

“State and local governments are making a decision not to participate in civil immigration enforcement,” Fleming said.

Fleming said that doesn’t mean local law enforcement can’t help out in some cases.

“We’re not allowed to ask where you’re from. They made that part of the act,” he said.

The other side:

DuPage County Sheriff James Mendrick, who recently announced a run for governor as a Republican, said the Trust Act has forced police officers to choose between conflicting sets of state and federal laws.

“They’ve got the cops scared to death,” Mendrick said. “Cops are worried that if they take action, they’re gonna get sued.”

Mendrick believes Illinois communities would be safer if police shared immigration status of criminal suspects right away, so ICE could apprehend them while in custody – as opposed to raiding homes, schools and businesses. But Fleming says the idea is to allow residents to come out of the shadows without fear of being deported by local police.

“Every study that has looked at it has uniformly found that TRUST Act doesn’t diminish community safety, and that in areas like domestic violence laws like the TRUST Act enhance community safety,” Fleming said.

But Mendrick says he believes the TRUST Act violates federal law and is calling for the Department of Justice to investigate.

“You can’t shield them from detection,” Mendrick said. “Giving them housing and putting 44 million into housing, sounds like shielding to me, sounds like harboring, sounds like participating.”

Fleming says the courts have already spoken and ruled in favor of the state’s implementation of the law.

“Frankly, this issue has been litigated over and over first in the first Trump administration and now in the second Trump administration,” he said.

An advocacy group with ties to Washington, D.C., is working to bring a national cruise line to the Illinois River that would make a stop in Peoria.

The Illinois River Cities and Towns Initiative, a group that advocates politically for cities and towns on the Illinois River, is in talks with American Cruise Lines to set up a cruise route that would travel the Illinois River and make a stop in Peoria.

Representatives from the IRCTI told the Peoria City Council on Tuesday night that if the city agreed to spend $22,600 on a membership fee and join its group, it could become part of an initiative that, among other things, is trying to bring a cruise line to the Illinois River.

While the proposed cruise line wouldn’t be permanently stationed in Peoria, like the bygone Spirit of Peoria riverboat that left the city in 2022, members of the Peoria City Council said a cruise line stop in Peoria could bring back some of the energy and money the riverboat once provided to the city’s riverfront.

The proposed cruise line route — which is notably just an idea the IRCTI has kicked to American Cruise Lines — would fly guests to Chicago and then have them board a boat in Ottawa, Illinois. The boat would travel down the Illinois River and travel through Peoria on its way to the Mississippi River where it would then turn south to St. Louis or north to Minneapolis.

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Bringing a cruise line to the Illinois River was just a small piece of the pitch the IRCTI delivered to the City Council on Tuesday. Ultimately, what the IRCTI said it would advocate for is making the Illinois River part of federal discussions around funding for environmental and business development programs that could tap Peoria into millions of dollars.

To join the coalition Peoria, has to pay a $22,600 joining fee and then an annual fee every year it stays part of the group. The coalition includes cities such as Pekin, East Peoria, Ottawa, La Salle, Peru and Beardstown.

The City Council voted 9-2 on Tuesday to pay the $22,630 membership fee to join the IRCTI.

Councilmember Denis Cyr said he hopes the program is successful and does bring the millions of dollars to Peoria that was mentioned in the group’s sales pitch, but he voted against the measure because Peoria is the only city on the Illinois River that has a mandate from the Environmental Protection Agency to reduce its pollution into the river.

Councilmember Alex Carmona voted against the measure because he wants Peoria to find ways to be more “business friendly” that do not cost the city money.

While he voted for the measure, councilmember John Kelly expressed skepticism that the advocacy group would succeed in its pitched endeavors to bring millions of federal dollars to Peoria. Kelly said he was not skeptical of the group’s “intentions” but rather “what it can actually do.”

Mayor Rita Ali was joined by eight other councilmembers, including Kelly, in supporting the city’s membership into the IRCTI.

Ali said the initiative will “attract millions of dollars to Peoria.”

Councilmember Denise Jackson was excited at the idea of bringing a passenger boat back to Peoria. She said $22,000 was a “drop in the bucket” compared to the earning potential that having a cruise line stop in Peoria could bring to the city.

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Illinois joined 15 other states Monday in suing the Trump administration over plans to return forced-reset triggers that were confiscated by federal law enforcement and once again allow them to be sold. The devices are used to make semiautomatic rifles fire faster.

The suit, filed in Maryland, argues the administration’s action violates federal law and poses a threat to residents and law enforcement because of the capacity of the devices to worsen gun violence.

There had been several legal battles over forced-reset triggers, which replace standard triggers on AR-15-style rifles. The government for years had argued that they were illegal machine gun conversion devices because constant finger pressure on the triggers could keep a rifle firing essentially like an automatic.

Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul said he would continue to enforce the ban on the devices through state law that bars owning them and other devices — such as bump stocks — that can also make semiautomatic rifles fire more rapidly.

“The Trump administration’s decision to redistribute devices that convert firearms into machine guns is extreme and would have a devastating effect on the safety of communities across our country,” Raoul said. “ Federal law bans these devices, and this settlement does not change the law. Illinois law is also clear: Forced reset triggers are unlawful. I will continue to enforce the ban on forced reset triggers under Illinois law.”

Colorado, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington joined Illinois in the suit.

Forced-reset triggers were previously considered illegal machine guns by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Forearms and Explosives, but the Justice Department reached a settlement with Rare Breed Triggers last month to allow their sale. The company was previously represented by David Warrington, who is now Trump’s White House counsel.

As part of the settlement, Rare Breed Triggers alone agreed not to make equivalent triggers for handguns, but would require the ATF to return triggers that it had seized or that owners had voluntarily surrendered to the government and stop enforcing federal law banning them.

Trump banned bump stocks — similar devices that allow rifles to fire faster — shortly after a gunman fired more than 1,000 rounds in 11 minutes into an outdoor country music festival in 2017 on the Las Vegas Strip, killing 58 people and wounding more than 850 among the crowd of 22,000. Last year the Supreme Court struck down a federal ban on bump stocks and similar devices, though Illinois’ ban remained in place.