Politics
Pritzker pushes prosecutions of Trump officials as part of Dem ‘Project 2029’ agenda
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Illinois Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker said that Democrats should seek criminal prosecution against Trump administration and law enforcement officials who have “broken the law” if they were to gain control of the White House in 2028.
Pritzker, who is running for a third gubernatorial term, sat down for an interview with the New York Times in which he proposed Democrats adopt their own version of Project 2025 — the Heritage Foundation’s conservative policy blueprint for presidential administrations released in nearly every election cycle since the 1980s. Pritzker dubbed the Democrats’ counter “Project 2029,” urging it to be quickly implemented to “restore the rule of law.”
“I don’t think you can speak of it in shorthand, but we’ve got to restore the rule of law, and that means holding people accountable who’ve broken the law,” Pritzker said. “I’m talking about the people in this administration who’ve broken the law and federal agents who’ve broken the law.”
New York Times reporter Lulu Garcia-Navarro asked Pritzker whether this meant Trump officials and law enforcement agents would face criminal prosecution.
TRUMP SAYS CHICAGO MAYOR, ILLINOIS GOVERNOR ‘SHOULD BE IN JAIL FOR FAILING TO PROTECT’ ICE OFFICERS
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker speaks to members of the media at Manny’s Cafeteria and Delicatessen during a primary election in Chicago, Illinois, on Tuesday, March 17, 2026. (Credit: Christopher Dilts / Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“Criminally prosecuted, civilly prosecuted,” Pritzker said. “Whatever it is that we can do.”
Trump and Pritzker have been at odds over Trump’s immigration enforcement agenda for months.
Last October, Pritzker filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration over its deployment of National Guard troops to Chicago. The lawsuit argued that the deployment of the National Guardsmen to the Windy City was “unconstitutional and/or unlawful.”
PRITZKER CLAIMS COUNTRY UNDER TRUMP WORSE THAN COVID PANDEMIC WHERE PEOPLE DIED ‘IN DROVES’
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents walk down a street during a multi-agency targeted enforcement operation in Chicago, Illinois, on Sunday, Jan. 26, 2025. President Donald Trump has pledged to carry out the largest deportation effort in U.S. history, vowing to ultimately deport all people living in the country without legal status. (Christopher Dilts / Bloomberg via Getty Images)
U.S. District Judge April Perry issued a temporary restraining order preventing the deployment of National Guard troops to the state as the lawsuit worked its way through the legal system. The Supreme Court also upheld Perry’s decision. The Trump administration withdrew federal troops from the state in January.
Pritzker and Trump have also clashed over the tactics used by federal immigration enforcement agents in Illinois. Pritzker has accused federal agents of “waging war on our people” and “acting like jackbooted thugs.”
U.S. President Donald Trump attends a tour of a Thermo Fisher Scientific facility in Reading, Ohio, on March 11, 2026. Trump is highlighting his administration’s push to lower drug prices at the biotechnology and pharmaceutical company. (Andrew Harnik / Getty Images)
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The Trump administration faces another lawsuit stemming from accusations of immigration enforcement agents’ alleged misconduct during Operation Midway Blitz in Chicago. Plaintiffs in the lawsuit accused federal agents of violating protesters’ constitutional rights through their use of tear gas and force. District Judge Sara Ellis issued a preliminary injunction barring federal agents’ use of force and tear gas on protesters, but an appeals court overturned her decision earlier this month.
Fox News Digital reached out to Pritzker’s office and the White House for comment.
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President Donald Trump marked Cinco de Mayo on Tuesday with a new Truth Social post featuring a stylized “NICE” graphic — a play on Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.
The post adds to a string of Cinco de Mayo messages from Trump that have repeatedly drawn attention online, including his widely shared 2016 taco bowl post that resurfaces nearly every year around the holiday.
Trump has frequently used the holiday to share posts blending humor, politics and immigration messaging; and had already publicly embraced the “NICE” branding concept ahead of Tuesday’s post.
The image shared Tuesday featured an eagle-and-shield design above the word “NICE,” styled similarly to federal law enforcement branding and appearing to reference ICE.
TRUMP VOWS NOT TO HELP BLUE CITIES WITH RIOTS, INSTRUCTS ICE AND BORDER PATROL TO PROTECT FEDERAL PROPERTY
A stylized graphic reading “NICE,” a reference to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, features an eagle and shield design in an image shared by President Donald Trump on Cinco de Mayo. (@realDonaldTrump via X)
Trump endorsed the idea of rebranding ICE as “NICE” in a late April Truth Social post, writing: “GREAT IDEA!!! DO IT.”
The phrase originated from a social media suggestion that Trump later amplified online.
The latest post also brought renewed attention to Trump’s most recognizable Cinco de Mayo moment.
HERE ARE 5 OF GUY FIERI’S FAVORITE TACO SPOTS ACROSS AMERICA AHEAD OF CINCO DE MAYO
President Donald Trump poses with a taco bowl at Trump Tower in a Cinco de Mayo post shared in 2016. (@realDonaldTrump via X)
In 2016, then-candidate Trump posted a photo of himself eating a taco bowl at Trump Tower alongside the caption: “Happy #CincoDeMayo! The best taco bowls are made in Trump Tower Grill. I love Hispanics!”
The post quickly went viral and has continued resurfacing online in the years since.
The image showed Trump seated at a desk with a taco bowl in front of him, giving a thumbs up as he posed for the camera.
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The emblem of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement appears on a smartphone screen with the U.S. flag displayed on a laptop screen in Athens, Greece, on Feb. 3, 2026. (Nikolas Kokovlis/NurPhoto)
Last year, Trump reshared the taco bowl post and wrote: “This was so wonderful, 9 years ago today!”
The post continues to go viral online as users revisit the original taco bowl image each year on the holiday.
One user posted an image of the president’s original 2016 taco bowl post, writing, “Cinco de Trumpo.”
Another commenter wrote, “such a classic,” and another quipped, “maybe the greatest tweet of all time.”
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Trump’s original taco bowl post remains one of the most recognizable Cinco de Mayo moments of the social media era.
The White House did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
SACRAMENTO — State elections officials warned voters Tuesday to send their mail-in ballots in early after changes at the U.S. Postal Service that have led to slower mail service throughout California.
Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta and Secretary of State Shirley Weber said vote-by-mail ballots should be put in the mail at least a week before the June 2 election.
The officials also cast skepticism about social media posts that urge Democrats to vote “late” and to rally around one candidate in order to ensure a Republican doesn’t win. The posts are similar in wording and have spread on Facebook in the last week.
Bonta said the posts, which were brought up by The Times at a news conference in Sacramento, could be “misinformation” or “disinformation” and “potentially unlawful.”
“Get your ballot in the mail at least a week early,” he said. “You want to make sure your vote is counted. And the misinformation that you’re referencing is the misinformation we’re trying to combat.”
Voters using the postal service to mail their ballot within a week of the election should go inside the post office and ask that their ballot be postmarked, or can drop off their ballot at a secure voter box, officials said.
The new guidance comes after sweeping changes made by the Postal Service last year that has reduced the number of trips to pick up mail at post offices in mostly rural areas in the country, including California.
A Times analysis of last year’s November special election found that there was a significantly higher number of mail-in ballots that arrived too late to be counted compared with the 2024 election.
Rural counties saw some of the biggest increase in rejected ballots because they came in too late, The Times found.
The changes to the Postal Service are nationwide, but are particularly relevant in California because the vast majority of people vote in the state using mail-in ballots.
Voters who mail a ballot on election day, or even two days before, may not see their vote counted because it will arrive too late, Bonta told reporters.
“You want your vote to be counted, I want your vote to be counted,” Bonta said. “If you vote earlier, you maximize that possibility that it will.”
Vote-by-mail ballots are considered late if they are not postmarked on or ahead of election day or if the postmarked ballots do not arrive within seven days of the election.
Weber’s office also said it would look into a recent trend of social posts that urge California Democrats to “vote late” in the June 2 election.
The posts, which have appeared on Facebook and Instagram, are similar in wording, and tell Democrats to hold off from voting early to ensure that two Republican don’t make the two top spots, and to rally around one Democrat.
California’s primary election system allows the two candidates who received the most votes to advance to the November election, regardless of party.
With many Democrats crowding the ballot this year, some Democratic leaders have expressed concern fear that two Republicans — businessman Steve Hilton and Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco — will take the top two spots because Democratic voters will be splintered among the party’s top seven candidates.
The validity of the social media posts are under scrutiny.
One post on Facebook last week, for instance, purports to be written by historian Heather Cox Richardson. The post warned voters not to vote until after all the debates in California have concluded and the front-runner is clear.
Richardson told The Times that she’s not connected to the post. “I didn’t write it and we can’t figure out who did,” she said in an email. “I haven’t — and won’t — take any position in a primary.”
The last statewide election in California was closely watched after the U.S. Department of Justice said would monitor polling sites in some California counties after a request by California Republican Party officials.
However, the election proceeded without any incident.
Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday sent a letter to elections officials in the state’s 58 counties that highlighted recent legislation mandating that California ballots be counted within 13 days, instead of 30 days. Newsom thanked the elections staff for their work and urged a speedy vote count.
“We must acknowledge that the longer the voting count takes,” Newsom wrote, “the more mis- and disinformation spreads.”
The Education Department has opened a civil rights investigation into whether Smith College, the women’s school in Northampton, Mass., violated anti-discrimination laws by allowing transgender students to enroll.
The inquiry broadens the Trump administration’s bid to limit rights for the nation’s transgender students by targeting school admissions for the first time. Until now, the administration had mostly targeted policies that allowed for transgender women to participate in women’s sports and use women’s bathrooms.
By investigating Smith, the administration is raising the question of whether allowing transgender women to enroll at a women’s college — and providing access to “women-only” spaces such as bathrooms, dormitories and locker rooms — violates civil rights protections for women.
Kimberly Richey, the assistant secretary for civil rights at the Education Department, said in a statement that “an all-women’s college loses all meaning if it is admitting biological males.”
“Allowing biological males into spaces designed for women raises serious concerns about privacy, fairness and compliance under federal law,” Ms. Richey said. “The Trump administration will continue to uphold the law and fight to restore common sense.”
The college issued a statement acknowledging the investigation and stating that it remained “fully committed to its institutional values, including compliance with civil rights laws.”
About 4.7 percent of college students identify as transgender, according to the Society for Evidence-Based Gender Medicine, a group of doctors and scientists that has called for more government regulation of pediatric gender medicine.
The federal investigation was in response to a civil-rights complaint filed by Defending Education, a nonprofit group founded in 2021 that has become one of the leading voices in the growing parents’ rights movement. Several of the group’s complaints have sparked federal civil rights investigations during the past year, and its research is often cited during congressional hearings by conservative lawmakers.
Formerly known as Parents Defending Education, the Arlington, Va.-based group posted on its website a letter from the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights on Monday announcing the investigation into Smith.
Smith, one of the nation’s largest women’s schools with about 2,500 students, has been admitting transgender students since 2015, along with several other top women’s colleges. The issue became a lightning rod at women’s colleges after a transgender applicant was denied acceptance to Smith in 2013 because her gender identity did not match her financial aid forms.
Since then, most women’s colleges updated their admissions policies to welcome transgender applicants. One notable exception has been Sweet Briar College in central Virginia, which does not admit transgender students and helps students in transition transfer to another college.
The Trump administration resolved 30 percent fewer civil rights complaints in the nation’s schools in 2025 compared with the Biden administration in 2024, the sharpest year-over-year decline in at least three decades. But the new administration has opened more than 40 civil rights investigations into schools and other educational institutions that provide protections for transgender students.
The Education Department has taken the unusual step of backing out of civil rights agreements that previous administrations negotiated to protect transgender students. The government has also sued state education departments and high school athletic associations in California and Minnesota over policies that permit transgender athletes to participate in school sports.
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