Hello and welcome to the latest updates in US politics. We begin with the report that a limited contingent of National Guard troops has begun guarding federal property in the Chicago area and assisting law enforcement in Memphis on Wednesday, according to officials.
Deployment Details
An unit of 200 Texas Guard troops were working in the Chicago area, according to a representative for the US Northern Command, who communicated with the news agency on condition of anonymity in order to reveal operational details that have not been officially released.
The troops are in the urban area to protect US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities and other federal facilities and law enforcement personnel, Northern Command stated publicly.
The forces, along with about three hundred Illinois personnel, had arrived Tuesday at a US Army Reserve Center in Elwood, approximately 90 kilometers southwest of Chicago. All five hundred personnel are under the Northern Command and have been activated for 60 days. The official wasn't able to immediately offer details about how the troops were armed.
Political Context
It coincides with Donald Trump on Wednesday demanded the jailing of Brandon Johnson, Chicago's city leader, and JB Pritzker, the Illinois governor, accusing them of not protecting US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers.
"The city's mayor should be in jail for failing to protect ICE personnel!" Trump posted on Truth Social on Wednesday morning. "The state governor also!"
Both the mayor and governor are members of the Democratic party. Trump's comments come as state military forces have started deployment in the Chicago area at the order of the federal administration, despite objections from state authorities, including Pritzker and Johnson.
Additional Developments
- The president declared that Hamas and Israel have agreed to a tentative deal to end the fighting in Gaza, and release Israeli hostages and detained persons.
- News of the Gaza agreement was praised by GOP legislators, who urged Trump to be awarded the Nobel Peace prize this week, but greeted with more trepidation by Palestinian Americans.
- During presidential gathering, Trump seemed unfamiliar with the term 'legal principle' and deferred to Kristi Noem. In May, Noem gave a highly incorrect explanation of the core legal principle that mandates that the authorities provide a official justification for arresting and jailing people.
- All of the witnesses who provided statements at the White House "antifa roundtable" hosted by the administration on Wednesday were self-described independent journalists who might better be called partisan conservative social media influencers. The content producers report on leftwing protests in a highly political manner, more similar to opposition research than nonpartisan reporting.
- Senate Republicans rejected a war powers resolution that would have checked Trump's authority to use lethal armed action against alleged narcotics traffickers after Democrats tried to oppose the administration's unprecedented deployment of the armed forces to destroy boats in the Caribbean.
- During the White House "political discussion" on Wednesday, at least a participant echoed Trump's false claim that large numbers of people have been killed by political extremists in the Oregon city. The accurate count of killings by political activists in Portland is: a single incident.
