Gov. J.B. Pritzker stands behind President Joe Biden

Gov. J.B. Pritzker on Tuesday stood solidly behind President Joe Biden in the governor’s first public comments since he and other Democratic governors met with the president last week amid calls from leaders within the party for Biden to step aside.

“The president did a great job of answering questions throughout that meeting. Listen, Joe Biden is our nominee. I am for Joe Biden. I’ve been campaigning for Joe Biden. I think you’ve seen I’ve got dates scheduled to go to Indiana, to Ohio, for Joe Biden, so Joe Biden is going to be our nominee,” Pritzker said following an event on the West Side.

But as at least one other high-profile Democratic governor has vowed not to run for president should Biden have a change of heart and drop out, Pritzker declined to take such a pledge,

“I’m not engaging in any hypotheticals. You can see that I’m all in for Joe Biden. Joe Biden is going to be the nominee of the Democratic Party. I’m going to go out there and wholeheartedly campaign for him,” Pritzker said.

Pritzker’s comments were his first since a White House meeting last week between Biden and Democratic governors from across the nation following Biden’s dismal performance at a June 27 debate against presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump.

After that meeting, Pritzker’s campaign released only a short statement saying only the roughly 90-minute meeting “was candid and
(Pritzker) appreciated hearing directly from the president.”

In addition to being governor of the sixth-largest state in the nation, the billionaire Illinois governor has been in the national spotlight both as a possible future presidential candidate and as the governor hosting the Democratic National Convention, which will take place in Chicago next month.

Pritzker has been discussed nationally as a possible replacement for Biden should the president step aside. So too has Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, another high-profile Democrat who recently shut down the idea that she might become a presidential candidate this year if Biden were to step down.

Pritzker on Tuesday also discounted the notion of what would be an historic brokered convention. ” I don’t expect that to happen,” Pritzker said. “We’re going to have an orderly convention.”

Pritzker acknowledged that he wants Biden “to go out there and answer all the questions” people have given his poor debate performance, which led to concerns about the viability of the 81-year-old president’s candidacy against Trump, 78. But Biden, while admitting he admitted he did poorly in the debate, has insisted he’ll remain in the race.

Illinois U.S. Rep. Mike Quigley is among small group of national Democrats to publicly call for Biden to step aside. Others, including members of the Congressional Black Caucus, have continued to throw support behind Biden, Pritzker noted.

“It’s not unreasonable for people to have differing opinions about all of this,” Pritzker said in response to Quigley’s comments. “But I know Mike Quigley. I know he does not want Donald Trump to become president of the United States,”

The governor’s comments Tuesday also came shortly after Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson’s office confirmed the mayor will join a call with Biden and other Democratic mayors Tuesday evening.

Pritzker is among those who make up a broad bench of Democrats whose names have been floated as a possible replacement for Biden or as a future Democratic nominee. He’s raised his national profile significantly in recent years, serving as a Biden surrogate and backing abortion rights initiatives through his national organization, Think Big America.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz sought last week’s meeting between Biden and Democratic governors after Biden’s stumbling debate performance June 27.  Unlike Michigan’s Whitmer and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who also has been mentioned as a potential Biden replacement, Pritzker did not offer a strong statement in support of the president immediately after the meeting.

On Tuesday, Pritzker said supportive comments from Walz, who’s the head of the Democratic Governors Association, and two other governors following the meeting represented the entire group.

“Some weren’t able to be at the White House and some of us had to go catch a plane,” Pritzker said, alluding to his absence at that press conference. “The truth is that it was, I think, a robust discussion, and I just wanted to be accurate about how I recorded what happened in that meeting,” Pritzker said Tuesday.