President Donald Trump on Wednesday ominously called for Chicago’s mayor and the governor of Illinois to be jailed, hours after sending National Guard troops into the state despite their opposition.“Chicago Mayor should be in jail for failing to protect Ice Officers! Governor Pritzker also!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform, referring to immigration agents.Trump pushing for the imprisonment of Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker — both Democrats — comes as troops that Trump federalized from the National Guard in Texas arrived at an Army Reserve center in Illinois, despite a lawsuit and vigorous opposition from elected leaders.Pritzker swiftly called out the president’s talk of jail.“I will not back down,” Pritzker, who is seen as a potential Democratic presidential candidate, wrote on X.He added, “Trump is now calling for the arrest of elected representatives checking his power. What else is left on the path to full-blown authoritarianism?”On CNN, Johnson called Trump “unstable” and “unhinged,” adding: “It’s certainly not the first time that Donald Trump has called for the arresting of a Black man unjustly. I’m not going anywhere.”Trump’s vow to send the National Guard to Chicago followed an aggressive immigration crackdown that started last month and has led to clashes with protesters.Pritzker earlier this week accused the Trump administration of deliberately trying to sow “chaos” in Chicago as a “pretext” to deploy troops to the nation’s third-largest city.Speaking at a press conference Monday, Pritzker said Trump is “following a playbook.” “Cause chaos, create fear and confusion, make it seem like peaceful protesters are a mob by firing gas pellets and tear gas canisters at them,” he said. Amid the deployment of the military to a growing number of U.S. cities, and Trump’s talk of fighting “a war from within,” the president and senior members of his administration have attempted to paint Chicago as a crime-ridden “hell hole,” even though police statistics show significant drops in most crimes, including homicides.Trump’s targeting of Johnson and Pritzker is the latest example of his brazen calls for his opponents to be prosecuted or locked up.His post came on the same day as former FBI Director and long-time Trump foe James Comey pleaded not guilty on charges of lying to Congress after the president pressured Attorney General Pam Bondi to prosecute his political enemies. Close