Hello and welcome to the latest updates in US politics. We start with the news 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, according to officials.
Deployment Details
An unit of two hundred Texas military personnel were working in the Greater Chicago region, according to a representative for the US Northern Command, who communicated with the news agency on condition of anonymity in order to reveal mission specifics that have not been officially released.
The troops are in the city to protect US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities and other government properties and police officers, Northern Command stated publicly.
The forces, along with about 300 from Illinois, had arrived Tuesday at a US Army Reserve Center in Elwood, 55 miles southwest of Chicago. All 500 troops are under the military command and have been activated for 60 days. The spokesperson wasn't able to immediately offer details about how the troops were armed.
Political Context
It coincides with Donald Trump on Wednesday called for the imprisonment of Brandon Johnson, Chicago's city leader, and JB Pritzker, the Illinois 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 personnel!" Trump posted on Truth Social on Wednesday morning. "The state governor also!"
Both Johnson and Pritzker are members of the Democratic party. Trump's comments come as national guard troops have begun arriving in the Chicago area at the direction of the Trump administration, despite objections from state authorities, including Pritzker and Johnson.
Other Updates
- Donald Trump announced that the conflicting parties have accepted a provisional agreement to end the fighting in Gaza, and release captured individuals and Palestinian prisoners.
- News of the Middle East deal was praised by GOP legislators, who called on Trump to be awarded the Nobel Peace prize this week, but greeted with more trepidation by Arab-American communities.
- During presidential gathering, Trump seemed unfamiliar with the term 'Habeas Corpus' and deferred to Kristi Noem. In May, the secretary gave a wildly inaccurate explanation of the core legal principle that requires that the authorities provide a official justification for detaining and imprisoning people.
- All of the participants who provided statements at the White House "political discussion" hosted by the president on Wednesday were identified as freelance reporters who might more accurately described as political content creators. The influencers report on liberal demonstrations in a partisan fashion, more akin to opposition research than nonpartisan reporting.
- Senate Republicans rejected a military authorization measure that would have checked Trump's authority to use deadly military force against alleged narcotics traffickers after Democrats tried to oppose the government's unprecedented deployment of the armed forces to eliminate vessels in the Caribbean Sea.
- During the White House "antifa roundtable" on Wednesday, at least one witness repeated Trump's inaccurate statement that significant amounts of people have been killed by left-wing radicals in the Oregon city. The correct number of killings by political activists in Portland is: one.
