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Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker is rolling out the red carpet for Democratic state lawmakers who fled Texas as they push back against a move by President Donald Trump to add five Republican-controlled congressional seats in their state.
“I’m going to do everything I can to make sure that they’re welcome here, that they have the ability to stay as long as they need to and want to,” Pritzker, a Democrat, said on Sunday evening as the lawmakers arrived in Illinois.
The lawmakers fled Texas in order to prevent the quorum needed in the Republican-dominated state legislature to vote on Monday on the new redistricting maps, which passed a committee vote this past weekend along party lines.
TEXAS’ CONSERVATIVE GOVERNOR VOWS TO REMOVE FLEEING DEMOCRAT STATE LAWMAKERS FROM OFFICE
Texas House Democratic Caucus Chair Rep. Gene Wu spoke during a news conference in Chicago after Texas Democrats fled the state to avoid voting on a redistricting proposal. Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, left, called Wu and the other Texas lawmakers “courageous.” (Scott Olson/Getty Images)
The redistricting push in Texas is part of a broader effort by the GOP across the country to keep control of the House and cushion losses elsewhere in the country, as the party in power traditionally faces political headwinds and loses seats in midterm elections.
But veteran Republican strategist Matt Whitlock argued that the decision by most of the Democratic lawmakers to head to Illinois – with a few others decamping in two other blue states, New York and Massachusetts – was “cartoonishly dumb.”
Tom Bevan, the RealClearPolitics co-founder and president, wrote on X, “The idea that Texas Democrats would flee to Illinois, a state where Dems have abused gerrymandering to comical levels, is perfection.”
“To protest ‘partisan gerrymandering’ Texas Democrats are fleeing to…Illinois,” Republican Missouri Senator Eric Scmitt wrote on X. “You can’t make this up.”
TEXAS DEMOCRATS FLEE STATE TO BLOCK TRUMP-BACKED REDISTRICTING VOTE IN DRAMATIC LEGISLATIVE MOVE
Pritzker, the two-term Illinois governor who is seen as a potential 2028 Democratic Party White House hopeful, has criticized Trump and Republicans for “cheating” as they push for rare mid-decade congressional redistricting.
“Texas Democrats were left with no choice but to leave their home state to block a vote from taking place and protect their constituents. This is a righteous act of courage,” the governor claimed.
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