Hello and welcome to the latest updates in US politics. We start with the news that a small number of National Guard troops has begun guarding federal property in the Greater Chicago region and supporting police operations in Memphis on Wednesday, as confirmed by authorities.
Deployment Details
An unit of two hundred Texas military personnel were working in the Greater Chicago region, according to a spokesperson for the US Northern Command, who spoke to the news agency on condition of anonymity in order to discuss mission specifics that have not been officially released.
The military personnel are in the city to secure US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) buildings and other federal facilities and law enforcement personnel, Northern Command said online.
The troops, along with about 300 from Illinois, had reached on 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 information about how the personnel were equipped.
Political Context
It coincides with Donald Trump on Wednesday called for the jailing of Brandon Johnson, Chicago's mayor, and JB Pritzker, the state governor, charging them of not protecting US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers.
"Chicago Mayor should be in prison for failing to protect ICE personnel!" Trump wrote on Truth Social on Wednesday morning. "The state governor also!"
Both the mayor and governor are Democrats. Trump's comments come as national guard troops have begun arriving in the Greater Chicago region at the order of the federal administration, despite opposition from state authorities, including the governor and mayor.
Additional Developments
- The president announced that Hamas and Israel have agreed to a tentative deal to end the fighting in Gaza, and free Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners.
- Reports about the Middle East deal was praised by Republican lawmakers, who called on Trump to be given the Nobel Peace prize this week, but received with greater caution by Palestinian Americans.
- During presidential gathering, Trump appeared not to recognize the term 'legal principle' and referred to his homeland security secretary. In May, Noem gave a wildly inaccurate explanation of the core legal principle that requires that the government provide a public reason for detaining and imprisoning people.
- All of the participants who provided statements at the White House "political discussion" hosted by the administration on Wednesday were self-described independent journalists who might more accurately described as political content creators. The influencers report on leftwing protests in a highly political manner, more akin to political investigation than nonpartisan reporting.
- Senate Republicans rejected a war powers resolution that would have checked Trump's ability to use deadly military force against alleged narcotics traffickers after Democrats tried to oppose the administration's extraordinary use of the armed forces to eliminate vessels in the Caribbean.
- During the White House "antifa roundtable" on Wednesday, at least a participant repeated Trump's inaccurate statement that significant amounts of people have been killed by political extremists in Portland, Oregon. The accurate count of fatal incidents by political activists in Portland is: a single incident.
