Greetings and welcome to the latest updates in US politics. We begin with the report that a small number of National Guard troops has started protecting government facilities in the Greater Chicago region and assisting law enforcement in Memphis on Wednesday, as confirmed by authorities.
Deployment Details
An element of two hundred Texas military personnel were working in the Greater Chicago region, as stated by a spokesperson for the US Northern Command, who communicated with the Associated Press on condition of anonymity in order to reveal mission specifics that have not been officially released.
The troops 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 forces, along with about three hundred Illinois personnel, had arrived Tuesday at a US Army Reserve Center in Elwood, 55 miles southwest of Chicago. All five hundred personnel are under the Northern Command and have been deployed for 60 days. The spokesperson wasn't able to immediately offer details about how the troops were armed.
Background Situation
It comes as Donald Trump on Wednesday demanded the jailing of Brandon Johnson, Chicago's city leader, and JB Pritzker, the state governor, charging them of not protecting US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) personnel.
"Chicago Mayor should be in jail for not protecting Ice Officers!" Trump posted on Truth Social on Wednesday morning. "Governor Pritzker also!"
Both Johnson and Pritzker are members of the Democratic party. Trump's remarks coincide with national guard troops have begun arriving in the Chicago area at the direction of the federal administration, despite opposition from state authorities, including Pritzker and Johnson.
Other Updates
- The president declared that Hamas and Israel have accepted a provisional agreement to end the fighting in Gaza, and free Israeli hostages and detained persons.
- Reports about the Gaza agreement was praised by GOP legislators, 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 seemed unfamiliar with the term 'legal principle' and referred to his homeland security secretary. In May, Noem gave a highly incorrect definition of the core legal principle that mandates that the authorities provide a public reason for arresting and jailing people.
- All of the participants who contributed testimony at the White House "antifa roundtable" organized by the president on Wednesday were identified as freelance reporters who might better be called political content creators. The influencers report on leftwing protests in a partisan fashion, more similar to opposition research than nonpartisan reporting.
- Senate Republicans rejected a war powers resolution that would have checked Trump's authority to use deadly military force against suspected drug smugglers after opposition party tried to counter the administration's unprecedented deployment of the armed forces to eliminate vessels in the Caribbean Sea.
- During the White House "antifa roundtable" on Wednesday, at least a participant repeated Trump's inaccurate statement that large numbers of people have been murdered by political extremists in Portland, Oregon. The accurate count of fatal incidents by self-described "antifa" radicals in Portland is: one.
