Democrats confront billionaire question as Pritzker courts national spotlight
Illinois Governor JB Pritzker is running for a third term in November while actively building a national profile that has fueled 2028 presidential speculation. A Guardian profile published this week details the Democrat’s out-of-state activities, including a $20 million political action committee to support party campaigns nationwide, an upcoming address to the NAACP state conference in South Carolina — the first state in the Democratic presidential nominating process — and a recent trip to Texas to counter-program the state Republican convention.
The profile comes as Democrats search for a standard-bearer to challenge Trump in 2028, when the president is constitutionally barred from seeking a third term. Pritzker, first elected during Trump’s first term, has positioned himself as one of the party’s most vocal administration critics, drawing a contrast with Democrats who have pursued more cooperative relationships with the White House.
Pritzker, who according to The Guardian drew a comparison with Nazi Germany 30 days after Trump’s inauguration, used his February 2025 State of the State address to call for sustained opposition. “All I’m saying”, he declared, “is when the five-alarm fire starts to burn, every good person better be ready to man a post with a bucket of water if you want to stop it from raging out of control.” Two days after Trump’s 2024 re-election, Pritzker said the president would need to “come through me” to reach Illinois residents. The governor told The Guardian that the number of elected leaders willing to speak out aggressively against the administration is “finally” growing. “For one reason or another,” he said, “people have chosen to come on board with Team Fight, and get off of Team Cave.”
His tenure, Pritzker said, has been shaped by four crises: a fiscal shortfall inherited from his Republican predecessor, the Covid-19 pandemic, Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s decision to bus tens of thousands of migrants to Chicago, and Trump’s return to office. He pointed to raising the state minimum wage and codifying reproductive rights as signature achievements, and described his fiscal stewardship — credited by his campaign with multiple credit-rating upgrades — as akin to “reorienting an aircraft carrier 180 degrees.” Critics note that Illinois still carries one of the lowest credit ratings in the country.
Pritzker is widely expected to win a third term; his Republican opponent, state senator Darren Bailey, finished 12 points behind him in his previous race. Pritzker acknowledged one signature policy failure: his 2020 push to overhaul the state tax system from a flat rate to a graduated levy was rejected by voters.
The 2028 question hangs over the profile. Pritzker deflected when asked how many times he has been questioned about a presidential run. “National political reporters can’t help yourselves,” he said. Recent coverage — including a CBS News report that Pritzker has been using a GLP-1 medication and lost 80 pounds, framed by the network as preparation for a possible national bid — has done little to quiet the speculation. Asked directly whether Democrats are prepared to nominate a billionaire, Pritzker pushed back.
“When I ran in [the Illinois gubernatorial] Democratic primary in 2018, people asked the question, do we really want a businessman billionaire to be our Democratic candidate for governor?” he said. “Legitimate question today. Look at Elon Musk. Look at Sam Altman. Look at — we could make a list, whoever you want to fit in what sometimes people refer to as ‘the oligarchs’ in that group. I understand the skepticism that people have about wealthy people.”
Pritzker argued that his record in Illinois offsets concerns about his wealth. “Over the course of the last eight years … I’ve proven that I have, in fact, done more for working people in this state than maybe any governor in the country, and … restored services for the most vulnerable people in our state.” His $4.2 billion fortune, per Forbes, derives in part from his inheritance of the Hyatt hotel chain and his work running an investment firm with his brother. In 2024, Pritzker made more than $1.4 million playing blackjack on vacation; his campaign said the winnings were donated to charity.
On the 2024 election, Pritzker was critical of the Harris campaign’s messaging. Beyond the timing of President Joe Biden’s withdrawal 15 weeks before polling day, Pritzker said, the campaign should have focused on “putting money in people’s pockets,” citing the $7.25-per-hour federal minimum wage, which has been unchanged since 2009. “I think the campaign should have entirely been about working families, the middle class, people striving to get there, and the most vulnerable,” he told The Guardian.
The 2026 Democratic primaries, he said, showed voters rewarding candidates who addressed affordability. “I think there is a desperate need for elected officials to address affordability,” Pritzker said. “And the candidates that are winning are the ones who are communicating their passion for the issue, and their articulation of the policies that will bring that.” He acknowledged that a number of anti-establishment candidates, including members of the Democratic Socialists of America, have clinched Democratic nominations this year, but said they represent “a very, relatively small percentage of the results in primaries.”
Pritzker continues to draw sharp lines with the Trump administration. “He’s a wannabe authoritarian, and I don’t say that rhetorically,” Pritzker said, citing conversations with Holocaust survivors during his work on Illinois’s Holocaust Museum. “One thing that they would tell you is that you cannot give an authoritarian an inch.” Asked by The Guardian whether Democrats are ready to send a billionaire to the White House, Pritzker closed with a challenge of his own: “the real question is, what are your values? Not how much money do you have, but what do you believe?”