Greetings and welcome to the current 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 spoke to the Associated Press on background basis in order to discuss operational details that have not been made public.
The troops are in the city to protect US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) buildings and other government properties and law enforcement personnel, Northern Command stated publicly.
The forces, along with about 300 from Illinois, had reached on 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 two months. The official wasn't able to quickly provide information about how the personnel were equipped.
Background Situation
It coincides with Donald Trump on Wednesday called for the imprisonment of Brandon Johnson, Chicago's mayor, and JB Pritzker, the Illinois governor, accusing them of not protecting US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) personnel.
"The city's mayor should be in jail for not protecting ICE personnel!" Trump wrote on Truth Social on Wednesday morning. "Governor Pritzker also!"
Both the mayor and governor are Democrats. Trump's remarks coincide with national guard troops have begun arriving in the Chicago area at the order of the federal administration, despite opposition from Illinois officials, including Pritzker and Johnson.
Other Updates
- 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 Middle East deal was applauded by Republican lawmakers, who called on Trump to be awarded the Nobel Peace prize this week, but received with greater caution by Palestinian Americans.
- During White House event, Trump appeared not to recognize the term 'legal principle' and deferred to Kristi Noem. In May, Noem gave a highly incorrect 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" organized by the administration on Wednesday were identified as freelance reporters who might better be called political content creators. The content producers report on liberal demonstrations in a highly political manner, more akin to opposition research than nonpartisan reporting.
- GOP senators voted down 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 eliminate vessels in the Caribbean.
- During the White House "political discussion" on Wednesday, at least a participant echoed Trump's inaccurate statement that significant amounts of people have been killed by political extremists in Portland, Oregon. The accurate count of killings by self-described "antifa" radicals in Portland is: a single incident.
