Democratic Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker accused President Donald Trump of being too incompetent to lead the country because he suggested the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) prioritization of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) played a role in the tragic Washington, D.C., aircraft collision on Wednesday.

‘We face the unfortunate reality that we must be honest with the nation about: Donald Trump is unfit to lead during moments of crisis like this,’ Pritzker said in a statement Thursday night. 

The blue state governor, whom Trump evoked on the campaign trail as an example of the downfall of Democrat-run states, urged the Trump administration to respond to the American Airlines crash with ‘information and facts to instill confidence in our nation’s aviation safety.’

‘Before victims have even been identified, Trump is blaming people with disabilities,’ Pritzker said, referring to FAA DEI hiring practices. ‘He’s blaming the U.S. service members in the Blackhawk helicopter. He’s blaming hiring programs he can’t even name or offer examples of. The buck stops with him — yet he is failing to demonstrate his role as protector of the American people and head of our government.’

The second-term governor is among the long list of Democrats considering a 2028 presidential run. Pritzker has seized opportunities over the past two weeks to play a leadership role in Democrat opposition to Trump, refusing, for example, to follow Trump’s executive order ending birthright citizenship. 

Pritzker’s comments Thursday were the latest in a long-standing feud between the two. 

‘Sloppy J.B. Pritzker… has presided over the destruction and disintegration of Illinois at levels never seen before in any State,’ Trump wrote on Truth Social in June. ‘Crime is rampant and people are, sadly, fleeing Illinois. Unless a change is made at the Governor’s level, Illinois can never be Great Again!’

Trump’s attacks have veered into the ad hominem, labeling Pritzker a ‘rotund Governor from the once great State of Illinois, who makes Chris Christie look like a male model.’

In his statement, Pritzker demanded the Trump administration answer his ‘critical questions,’ including why the control tower was not fully staffed during the crash; why the Trump administration fired members of the Aviation Security Advisory Committee; whether the president now understands fully staffing federal agencies is a ‘matter of life and death’; and whether he plans to reverse federal workforce cuts. 

Pritzker questioned whether Elon Musk played a role in the removal of the former FAA director; why a replacement for FAA director was not named until after the crash; whether the federal government authorized the Blackhawk helicopter to fly on a commercial flight path; and if the government will continue allowing helicopters to fly at the same altitude as commercial planes.

‘Will the President, Vice President, Defense Secretary, and Transportation Secretary cooperate with the independent NTSB investigation and correct any misinformation they spread about the crash?’ Pritzker demanded to know.

Trump on Thursday listed headlines about Biden-era FAA DEI hiring that he suggested weakened the agency.

‘Here’s one,’ Trump said in the White House briefing room. ‘The FAA’s diversity push includes focus on hiring people with severe intellectual and psychiatric disabilities. That is amazing. And then it says the FAA says people with severe disabilities, the most underrepresented segment of the workforce, and they want them in. They can be air traffic controllers. I don’t think so.’

‘This was on January 14th, so that was a week before I entered office,’ Trump said, seeking to push blame onto the Biden administration. ‘They put a big push to put diversity into the FAA’s program.‘

Trump then expanded his list of conditions allowed among controllers: ‘Hearing, vision, missing extremities, partial paralysis, complete paralysis, epilepsy, severe intellectual disability, psychiatric disability, and dwarfism.’

The president drew a stark contrast between Democratic policies and his own first-week executive orders that halted DEI programs in the federal government and restored ‘the highest standards of air traffic controllers.’

‘Brilliant people have to be in those positions,’ he stated.

When asked how he came to the conclusion that diversity had something to do with the crash, the president said, ‘Because I have common sense.’

Pritzker is not the only potential 2028 Democratic presidential contender who took issue with Trump’s comments. After Trump called former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg a ‘disaster,’ Buttigieg, a 2020 Democratic primary candidate, called Trump’s comments ‘despicable.’

‘As families grieve, Trump should be leading, not lying,’ he wrote on X. ‘We put safety first, drove down close calls, grew Air Traffic Control, and had zero commercial airline crash fatalities out of millions of flights on our watch. President Trump now oversees the military and the FAA. One of his first acts was to fire and suspend some of the key personnel who helped keep our skies safe.’

Since taking office, President Donald Trump and his administration have become the target of multiple lawsuits over the president’s agenda and policies. 

The Trump White House has faced numerous legal challenges, including deportation policies, an executive order to end birthright citizenship and a directive to freeze federal funding.

Birthright citizenship 

On the day of his inauguration, Trump signed an executive order ending birthright citizenship for children of illegal immigrants, with many legal experts arguing that the right is enshrined in the Constitution under the 14th Amendment.

‘The privilege of United States citizenship is a priceless and profound gift,’ Trump says in the order, titled, ‘Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship.’

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration that same day ‘on behalf of organizations with members whose babies born on U.S. soil will be denied citizenship under the order.’ The ACLU also claimed the order is unconstitutional and against congressional intent and Supreme Court precedent.

Eighteen Democrat-led states then launched their own lawsuit, also claiming the order is unconstitutional and ‘unprecedented.’ 

‘The President has no authority to rewrite or nullify a constitutional amendment or duly enacted statute. Nor is he empowered by any other source of law to limit who receives United States citizenship at birth,’ the lawsuit reads.

Attorneys general from New Jersey, Massachusetts, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine and others signed on to the suit, along with the city and county of San Francisco, Calif., and Washington, D.C.

A U.S. district judge also temporarily blocked Trump’s order in a separate lawsuit filed by the states of Arizona, Illinois, Oregon and Washington, describing the action as ‘blatantly unconstitutional.’

Mass deportations

Several Chicago sanctuary city groups filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration over its mass deportation policy, saying it violates their First Amendment rights. 

The suit, filed by Brighton Park Neighborhood Council, Organized Communities Against Deportations, Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights Inc., and Raise the Floor Alliance, states that ‘the threat of ICE agents flooding into communities has already impacted Chicagoans and chilled their rights to freely exercise their religion and assemble.’

Ending DEI policies

Trump also signed an executive order ending all federal diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs. On Monday, the president signed an order stating that the ‘adoption of a gender identity inconsistent with an individual’s sex conflicts with a soldier’s commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in one’s personal life.’

Six transgender military members filed suit against the Trump administration, arguing that the order is unconstitutional and violates the Equal Protection component of the Fifth Amendment.

‘Rather than being based on any legitimate governmental purpose, the ban reflects animosity toward transgender people because of their transgender status,’ the suit claims. 

Freezing federal aid funding 

The Office of Management and Budget issued a memo on Monday with a directive to pause all federal grants and loans aiming to eradicate ‘wokeness’ and the ‘weaponization of government’ in an effort to improve government efficiency. The memo claims that nearly $3 trillion was spent in 2024 on such assistance programs. 

The White House shortly thereafter insisted that the freeze did not affect programs such as Social Security, Medicare or other entitlement payments.

Alongside Senate Democrats announcing a coordinated response with Democratic governors, blue state attorneys general, along with advocacy and non-profit groups, filed their own suits over the directive. 

On Tuesday, New York Attorney General Letitia James led a coalition of 22 other attorneys general suing to stop the implementation of the memo.

Likewise, a handful of non-profit organizations and health associations, including a LGBTQ+ advocacy group, filed a lawsuit Tuesday over the directive.

A federal judge on Tuesday imposed a stay on Trump’s action, delaying it until Monday.

Fox News Digital’s Adam Shaw, Breanne Deppisch and Chris Pandolfo contributed to this report. 

A documentary about bridging the political divide in one of the most hotly contested battleground counties in the United States debuted at the Sundance Film Festival this week, leading some to conclude that the historically liberal festival is moving toward the center. 

‘One of the things that is fascinating about ‘Bucks County, USA’ being chosen as an official selection at Sundance is it appears, in the era of Trump being re-elected, the well-known left-leaning Sundance Film Festival is moving to the middle,’ Paul Martino said. ‘There is a new openness to dialogue,’ 

Martino, the founder of Bullpen Capital, told Fox News Digital about the documentary series ‘Bucks County, USA’ being screened at Sundance, a Utah festival known for screening films promoting liberal causes and being a place for anti-Trump demonstrations.

Martino, who is featured in the film, told Fox News Digital that the five-part docuseries is ‘all about the political divisions that happen in the United States focused on where I live, Bucks County, USA.’

It is about all of the post-COVID policies and all of the things that happened at the school board level once a lot of the parents’ rights movement started, and the film dives into a lot of detail about the political division that happened, and it focuses, ironically, on the friendship of my daughter and her best friend, who is what I would describe as my political rival’s daughter,’ Martino explained. 

Martino, a conservative, told Fox News Digital walking around Sundance was a ‘fascinating’ experience and that he encountered many people who seemed to be open to the movie’s message of listening to the other side.

‘Obviously, it is a rather left-leaning crowd in general. But even the people behind Sundance, the people who pick the films this year, said that they felt this film, ‘Bucks County, USA,’ was very important because it was in a Trump re-elected era,’ Martino said. 

‘Understanding and speaking to the other side and understanding who the other side is is important.

‘One of the amazing stories told by one of the filmmakers at Sundance was there’s a guy sitting next to me in a MAGA hat who I would have never talked to on the plane had I not made this movie and realized he had a lot to say to me. And the fact that this film affected even the filmmakers, I think, is a really interesting and important lesson for the rest of the country.’

While many people at Sundance were receptive to the film, Martino told Fox News Digital he did encounter some opposition from people at a question-and-answer session after the screening. 

‘I would say one of the only disappointments of the experience was I felt that some people in the crowd, you know, it’s an honor to be in the Q&A at the end of the series and, look, we had everybody up there. We had people who really don’t like each other, who disagree vehemently, and I think it was lost on the audience that all of us were standing there,’ Martino said. 

‘The fact that we all agreed to be part of this, the fact that we were all there and I got asked a question or two that were directed in my direction that I felt were a little bit inflammatory and I kind of chuckled to myself thinking, ‘Did you just watch the movie? And did you just see the fact that we’re all here? Maybe you missed a little something there.”

President Donald Trump’s envoy for special missions, Richard Grenell, has traveled to Venezuela to deliver an in-person message to socialist dictator Nicolás Maduro about accepting violent criminals deported from the United States.

On a call with reporters Friday, Mauricio Claver-Carone, the U.S. special envoy to Latin America, said Grenell will tell Maduro to take back all the Venezuelan criminals and Tren de Aragua gang members that have been ‘exported to the United States, and to do so unequivocally and without condition.’ 

Grenell will also demand that Venezuela immediately release American hostages being held in that country, Claver-Carone said.

The trip ‘focuses on two very specific issues. That we expect that Venezuelan criminals and gangs will be returned, as they are, to every country in the world, without conditions, and two, that American hostages need to be released immediately, unequivocally,’ he explained. 

‘This is not a quid pro quo. It’s not a negotiation in exchange for anything. President Trump himself has made that very clear.’ 

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed Friday that Grenell had arrived in Venezuela on orders from the president. 

Despite widespread belief among Venezuelans and much of the international community that Maduro lost the 2024 Venezuelan presidential election to opposition candidate Edmundo González Urrutia, he was sworn into his third six-year term earlier this month.

The U.S. does not recognize Maduro as the legitimate head of state of Venezuela.

Opposition leader María Corina Machado has called on Venezuelan citizens to protest the Maduro regime and demand that González be installed as the rightful president of Venezuela.

As many as 10 Americans are currently detained in Venezuela, although the State Department has not declared them wrongfully detained. Three are U.S. citizens who allegedly participated in a plot to destabilize the country, according to Venezuelan Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello.

The State Department has denied any U.S. involvement with a plot to overthrow Maduro. 

It remains unclear how many Americans are currently held in Venezuela following the significant prisoner swap in 2023 when Washington and Caracas negotiated the release of dozens of prisoners, including 10 Americans, in exchange for Colombian businessman Alex Saab, a close ally of Maduro.

Saab was arrested during the first Trump administration on charges related to a $350 million bribery scheme. 

Nearly three months after Democrats’ major setbacks up and down the ballot in the 2024 elections, the party gathers on Saturday to choose new leadership.

It’s the Democratic National Committee’s (DNC) first formal step to try and emerge from the political wilderness and rebound in upcoming elections after President Donald Trump recaptured the White House and Republicans flipped the Senate, held onto their fragile majority in the House and made major gains with working-class, minority and younger voters.

And with no clear leader in the party, the next DNC chair will become the de facto face of Democrats from coast to coast and will make major decisions on messaging, strategy, infrastructure and where to spend millions in political contributions.

‘It’s an important opportunity for us to not only refocus the party and what we present to voters, but also an opportunity for us to look at how we internally govern ourselves,’ longtime New Hampshire Democratic Party Chair Ray Buckley told Fox News.

Buckley, a former DNC vice chair, said he’s ‘very excited about the potential of great reform within the party.’ And he emphasized he hoped for ‘significantly more support for the state parties. That’s going to be a critical step towards our return to majority status.’

Eight candidates are vying to succeed DNC Chair Jaime Harrison, who decided against seeking a second straight four-year term steering the national party committee.

The next chair, as well as vice chairs and other officers, will be chosen by the roughly 450 DNC voting members gathered for the party’s winter meeting, which is being held this year at National Harbor just outside Washington, D.C.

Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party Chair Ken Martin, a DNC vice chair who has led the association of state Democratic Party chairs, is considered to be the frontrunner for chair heading into Saturday’s election, with Wisconsin Chair Ben Wikler close behind. 

Martin recently told Fox News Digital that if he becomes chair, the first thing he would do is ‘figure out a plan to win. And we need to start writing that plan, making sure we’re looking underneath the hood. How much money do we have at the party? What are the contracts? What contracts do we need to get rid of? And, frankly, bringing all of our stakeholder groups together. That’s the biggest thing.’

Wikler, in a Fox News Digital interview, emphasized that the party needs to show voters ‘that we’re fighting for them against those who would try to rig the economy for those at the very top and deliver that message in places where people aren’t paying attention to politics much. But they know what they’re struggling with in their own lives.’

Wikler, who pointed to the success of Democrats in his home state, a crucial battleground, added, ‘That means communicating in clear language in a way that shows people that we see them. And with our actions showing that we’re fighting for them to bring costs down and make sure that working people have a fair shot in this country.’

Also considered competitive is Martin O’Malley, the former two-term Maryland governor and 2016 Democratic presidential candidate who served as commissioner of the Social Security Administration during former President Biden’s last year in office.

O’Malley told Fox News Digital he’s running for DNC chair ‘because I love my country, and the only way we’re going to save the Republic is if the Democratic Party gets itself battle-ready as quickly as possible.’ 

Pointing to his past steering the Democratic Governors Association, he noted, ‘I’m the only candidate that’s actually chaired a national committee — the Democratic Governors — and I’m the only candidate that’s actually run for office and been elected to office, city council, mayor, governor. And we need to recruit people all across the ballot in order to bring our party back.’

Among the longer-shot candidates for chair are late entry Faiz Shakir, who ran the 2020 Democratic presidential campaign of progressive champion Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, and Marianne Williamson, who ran unsuccessfully for the 2020 and 2024 Democratic presidential nominations.

‘This party’s not going to rise up unless there’s some deeper honesty,’ Williamson told reporters Thursday after the final chair election forum, as she took aim at the Democrats’ establishment.

The debate during the three-month DNC campaign sprint has mostly focused on the logistics of modern political campaigns, such as media strategy and messaging, fundraising and grassroots organizing and get-out-the-vote efforts. On those nuts-and-bolts issues, the candidates are mostly in agreement that changes are needed to win back blue-collar voters who now support Republicans.

But the final forum included a heavy focus on systemic racism and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs, issues that appeared to hurt Democrats at the ballot box in November.

And the forum, moderated and carried live on MSNBC and held at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., devolved into chaos early on as a wave of left-wing protesters repeatedly interrupted the primetime event, heckling over concerns of climate change and billionaires’ influence in America’s elections before they were forcibly removed by security.

The chair election comes as a new national poll spells more trouble for the Democrats.

Only 31% of respondents in a Quinnipiac University survey conducted over the past week had a favorable opinion of the Democratic Party, with 57% seeing the party in an unfavorable light.

‘This is the highest percentage of voters having an unfavorable opinion of the Democratic Party since the Quinnipiac University Poll began asking this question,’ the survey’s release noted. 

Meanwhile, 43% of those questioned had a favorable view of the GOP, with 45% holding an unfavorable opinion, which was the highest favorable opinion for the Republican Party ever in Quinnipiac polling.