Greetings and welcome to the latest updates in American political affairs. We begin with the report that a small number of National Guard troops has started protecting federal property in the Chicago area and assisting law enforcement in Memphis on Wednesday, as confirmed by authorities.
Deployment Details
An unit of 200 Texas Guard troops were working in the Greater Chicago region, according to a representative for the US Northern Command, who communicated with the Associated Press on background basis in order to discuss mission specifics that have not been made public.
The military personnel are in the urban area to secure US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) buildings and other federal facilities and law enforcement personnel, Northern Command stated publicly.
The troops, along with about three hundred Illinois personnel, 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 military command and have been deployed for 60 days. The spokesperson wasn't able to quickly provide information about how the troops were armed.
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.
"The city's mayor should be in jail for not protecting Ice Officers!" Trump wrote on Truth Social on Wednesday morning. "Governor Pritzker also!"
Both the mayor and governor are members of the Democratic party. Trump's remarks come as state military forces have started deployment in the Chicago area at the direction of the federal administration, despite objections from Illinois officials, including the governor and mayor.
Other Updates
- The president declared that the conflicting parties have agreed to a provisional agreement to cease hostilities in Gaza, and release Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners.
- News of the Middle East deal was applauded by GOP legislators, who urged Trump to be awarded the peace award this week, but greeted with more trepidation by Arab-American communities.
- During White House event, Trump seemed unfamiliar with the term 'legal principle' and deferred to Kristi Noem. In May, Noem gave a wildly inaccurate definition of the fundamental legal concept 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 administration on Wednesday were identified as freelance reporters who might better be called partisan conservative social media influencers. The influencers report on liberal demonstrations in a partisan fashion, more akin to opposition research than nonpartisan reporting.
- Senate Republicans voted down a war powers resolution that would have checked Trump's authority to use lethal armed action against suspected drug smugglers after Democrats tried to oppose the government's extraordinary use of the military to destroy boats in the Caribbean Sea.
- During the White House "political discussion" on Wednesday, at least one witness repeated Trump's inaccurate statement that significant amounts of people have been murdered by political extremists in Portland, Oregon. The correct number of killings by self-described "antifa" radicals in Portland is: one.
