Gov. JB Pritzker and 16 Illinois Democrats sent a letter to the White House Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought on Tuesday demanding the Trump administration release $1.88 billion in federal funding to Illinois. Chair of the Illinois Republican Party Kathy Salvi dismissed it as Pritzker playing politics.
Pritzker, Sen. Dick Durbin, Sen. Tammy Duckworth and congressional Democrats said in the letter that Illinois is “in danger of needing to pause operations, cancel projects, or lay off staff” if their funding is not restored, leaving a “detrimental impact on vulnerable people, local economies, and the state as a whole.”
The Illinois Republican Party is pushing back on the Democrats’ claims, saying the letter “has no basis.”
“Governor Pritzker is grandstanding for his 2028 run for president instead of focusing on the mess that he’s left with us in Illinois. Since he’s been the governor, now in his seventh budget address, he has raised our budget by $16 billion from a $39 billion budget initially to $55 billion,” Salvi told Fox News Digital in an exclusive interview.
Fox News Digital reached out to OMB about the letter, but they did not provide a comment by the deadline of this article.
“On behalf of our constituents, we are seeking full transparency and accountability on any and all funding that has been paused or interrupted. If the Trump Administration is unable to follow the law and uphold their end of the deal, the people of our state deserve to know,” the Democrats said.
“He has defied law since day one,” Salvi countered. “This is a sanctuary state. He has caused the higher crime rates we have. He has caused the educational mess that we have here in the City of Chicago. He is not helping with solutions here. He’s distracting and using his weight in Washington to posture against this president and his administration’s agenda in order to catapult his own campaign for president in 2028. And this must be exposed.”
Pritzker also met with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries in Washington, D.C., this week to push for the release of Illinois’ federal funds.
“His travel to Washington is a distraction of the mess that he’s led here in Illinois,” Salvi said.
Salvi said Pritzker is asking for a “blank check” without “any examination of where the money goes.”
“Pritzker’s budget plan faces a $3 billion budget deficit. He has been given a blank check for the last four years. Now, he is being held to account. So, instead of dealing with the problems that he and his administration have caused here in Illinois, which are causing people to flee our state to neighboring states, he decides instead to distract and sue the federal government. Well, I think we need to have an accounting here in Illinois. We, Illinois taxpayers and citizens and families, we require results,” Salvi said.
A federal judge granted a preliminary injunction on Tuesday extending the block on the White House Office of Management and Budget’s federal funding freeze. Federal judges had previously issued a temporary restraining order to block the funding freeze.
Illinois was one of the initial 22 states and Washington, D.C., that sued President Donald Trump’s administration on Jan. 28 to unfreeze federal funds. OMB directed agencies to halt federal funding on Jan. 27 in compliance with Trump’s executive orders.
Gov. Josh Shapiro, D-Penn., in a separate lawsuit, sued the Trump administration to unfreeze federal funds on Feb. 13. Shapiro said that $2.1 billion in federal funds had been released and restored to Pennsylvania on Monday. While Shapiro said legal action was necessary to unfreeze his state’s federal funds, he added that his “direct engagement” with the Trump administration had led to the restoration of those funds.
Pritzker’s letter urged the Trump administration to “follow the law and make good on the government’s promise to deliver hard-earned taxpayer dollars back into Illinois’ economy, workforce and communities.”
The letter claims that many Illinois agencies have been forced to “pause operations, cancel projects, or cut staff” and have reported “their inability to access funds” since the OMB’s funding freeze memo. The letter says there have been “widespread reports of system outages and lockouts that prevented grantees from accessing entitled funding” since Jan 27.
“Attempted communications with government liaisons were often ignored and public statements from the White House were inconsistent with the experiences of our grantees,” the letter says.
Illinois Democrats allege that “14 state agencies, boards, and commissions have a total of $1.88 billion in impacted federal funds” that provide “technical assistance for small businesses, provide affordable solar energy for low-income residents, improve roads and bridges, and more.”
“These funds have been contractually agreed to, allocated, and planned around by their recipients–which include childcare providers, educational institutions, small businesses, community and economic development organizations, and more. Needless to say, the restriction of these funds will have a detrimental impact on vulnerable people, local economies, and the state as a whole,” the letter added.
The letter concludes by asking the Trump administration to answer five questions by March 4, 2025, about the disbursement of federal funds.
