Former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich blasted Democrat leaders in his home state of Illinois on Tuesday, accusing them of letting crime spiral out of control in Chicago for political reasons while turning their backs on vulnerable communities.
Appearing on “Rob Schmitt Tonight,” Blagojevich told Newsmax that Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson are more concerned with the optics of President Donald Trump solving the crime problem in Chicago than crime itself.
“They don’t want Trump in here to expose them for their failure to keep those neighborhoods safe,” Blagojevich said, pointing to opposition to Trump deploying the National Guard like he did in Washington.
“Secondly, they’re afraid to do the hard things that are necessary, backing the police in rough-and-tumble neighborhoods for fear that they may have a George Floyd incident on their hands,” he added.
Floyd died in May 2020 after struggling with and resisting police who were trying to arrest him on suspicion of counterfeiting.
He called the approach a “cynical political calculation” that puts lives at risk.
“It’s a life-and-death issue, Rob. There’s a moral quality to this, and they could [not] care less about Black lives. Black lives matter only to them, those Democrats, when it comes to votes,” he said.
Blagojevich argued Democrat politicians view crime solely through a political lens.
“They know what the stakes are. It’s all politics for them,” he said. “They could [not] care less whether or not Black people are dying in the South Side of Chicago or the West Side of Chicago, or Brown people are dying in places like the Humboldt Park neighborhood, where there was a drive-by shooting this past weekend.”
The former Democrat governor, who was pardoned by Trump after serving prison time on corruption charges, reserved his strongest criticism for Pritzker.
“JB Pritzker is the biggest hypocrite in American history, and there’s a racist quality to him,” Blagojevich said. “Because this would never be tolerated in the neighborhoods where white people live.”
He added, “Pritzker used to work for me. I plead guilty to that. I regret the fact that I hired him.”
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