The Resistance may seem a thin shadow of what it was during Donald Trump’s first term — but it still has beaucoup horsepower, which leaves ambitious Dem politicos jockeying for place ahead of 2026 and 2028 stuck trying to thread the needle on the border crisis.
Like Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, facing a re-election fight in 2026 and hungrily eyeing the White House after that.
The bumptious billionaire has already done incalculable damage to his state via woke policies.
And he ain’t stopping now!
Pritzker recently offered a Kafka-esque defense of his plan to simply ignore federal law and refuse to comply with some of the president’s deportation efforts.
There’s “a law in the books in Illinois that says that our local law enforcement will stand up for those law-abiding undocumented people in our state,” said J.B.
Huh? “Law-abiding” illegal immigrants? There’s no such thing: They came here illegally.
On the other hand, the hotel heir is now firmly in favor of kicking out “asylum seekers” who commit “other” crimes.
But Pritzker is far from the only state executive playing cynical power politics around immigration to buff up electability cred.
Mass. Gov. Maura Healey, the wokest of the woke on the East Coast (and that’s saying something), also faces a possible ’26 contest.
She’s outlined a self-contradictory approach similar to Pritzker’s, saying in the fall, “I still remain opposed on efforts to target large swaths of an undocumented population who’ve done nothing wrong other than they’re here without lawful presence.”
But with the capture in her state of sex-criminal illegal migrants plus a Haitian thug who screamed he was never going back, Healey’s agreeing that giving noncitizen rapists, killers and thieves the boot is necessary.
Then there’s the Big Tuna: California’s Gov. Gavin Newsom.
Newsom’s gone all-out to set himself up as a Trump antagonist; he demanded $50 million from his Legislature to fund so-called “Trump proofing” efforts in the Golden State — with a massive focus on fighting deportations.
The bills approving the money passed the state Senate, but during Assembly hearings over the issue, Republicans moved to slap down the bills — and Newsom’s party comrades buckled, leaving the money’s future unclear. Party leaders are reportedly asking for changes to make sure not a dime goes to criminal illegal migrants.
Proof these people — whatever they say — dig that Americans have had enough.
They’re trying to please the open-border extremists who set Biden policy, and still have a big megaphone in the national scene and in deep-blue states, but also need to reassure regular voters that they’re not planning to go full Joe.
Expect this ugly dance to continue. But make no mistake.
Refusing to openly, fiercely fight against all illegal immigration was one of the major issues that cost Democrats both Congress and the White House.
Re-running the Biden playbook with some cosmetic changes and huffing about kicking out the “bad ones” will only guarantee further losses.
