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House Majority Leader Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La., urged Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker to check his own backyard after he blamed President Donald Trump for fostering a climate in which political violence is tolerated.
“Governor Pritzker needs to look at the man in the mirror, and that’s where it needs to start,” Scalise told “Hannity” on Tuesday. “Stop the inciteful rhetoric that he and others like him are using deliberately. They know what they’re doing – it needs to stop.”
Scalise, a victim of political violence himself, shared the blunt message to Pritzker after his remarks in an interview with Politico.
“Our leaders set the tone in this country, and I think that the President of the United States has set a tone where political violence is okay. He’s advocated it himself before,” Pritzker told the outlet.
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Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker said President Donald Trump has created an atmosphere in the U.S. in which political violence is tolerated. (Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images; Talia Sprague/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
In 2017, Scalise was shot in the hip during an attack targeting Republican lawmakers during practice in Virginia for the annual Congressional Baseball Game for Charity. His grave injuries left him with no blood pressure and no pulse upon arriving in Washington D.C. via helicopter.
Scalise condemned the Illinois governor for using inflammatory rhetoric to describe President Trump, who Scalise noted, has been a target of multiple attempts of political violence.
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“Literally days into Donald Trump’s second term, he was comparing the president to Hitler and to Nazis, and he does this over and over again. He said, Republicans, remember that, Republicans cannot know a moment of peace. What does he mean by that?” Scalise said.
U.S. President Donald Trump is escorted out during the annual White House Correspondents’ Association dinner in Washington, D.C., U.S., April 25, 2026, in this screen capture from video. (Bo Erickson /Reuters)
Pritzker’s remarks come days after a shooter opened fire at the White House Correspondents Association Dinner, who in his manifesto outlined his targets as Trump administration officials – except for FBI Director Kash Patel.
“He wants to try to blame Republicans when it’s the right that is being attacked by the left over and again,” Scalise said.
The Illinois governor has repeatedly compared Trump’s governance to that of the Nazis and Adolf Hitler in Germany during World War II.
“Many of those attempted assassins on Donald Trump have regurgitated those very same words — ‘Nazi, threat to democracy’—that people like Governor Pritzker used when they tried to kill the president. So they need to stop doing it,” Scalise told host Sean Hannity.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise stands on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange before morning trading on April 15. (Adam Gray/Getty Images)
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Scalise went on to argue that Democratic rhetoric is increasingly targeting Republicans, warning that the party’s far-left wing has “taken over” the party.
“People need to vote this November because that is the kind of methodology and ideology that wants to take back over. We can’t let it happen,” he said.
