Greetings and welcome to the latest updates in US politics. We start with the news that a small number of state military forces has begun guarding government facilities in the Greater Chicago region 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, as stated by a spokesperson for the US Northern Command, who communicated with the Associated Press on condition of anonymity in order to discuss mission specifics that have not been made public.
The troops are in the city to secure US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities 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 Northern Command and have been deployed for 60 days. The official wasn't able to immediately offer information about how the troops were armed.
Political Context
It coincides with Donald Trump on Wednesday called for the imprisonment of Brandon Johnson, Chicago's mayor, and JB Pritzker, the state governor, charging them of failing to protect 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 Johnson and Pritzker are Democrats. Trump's remarks coincide with state military forces have begun arriving in the Chicago area at the order of the Trump administration, despite objections from state authorities, including Pritzker and Johnson.
Additional Developments
- Donald Trump announced that Hamas and Israel have accepted a provisional agreement to end the fighting in Gaza, and free captured individuals and detained persons.
- Reports about the Middle East deal was praised by Republican lawmakers, who called on Trump to be awarded the Nobel Peace prize this week, but received with greater caution by Arab-American communities.
- During presidential gathering, Trump appeared not to recognize the term 'legal principle' and deferred to his homeland security secretary. In May, Noem gave a wildly inaccurate definition of the fundamental legal concept that mandates that the authorities provide a official justification for detaining and imprisoning 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 cover leftwing protests in a highly political manner, more similar to opposition research than nonpartisan reporting.
- Senate Republicans voted down a war powers resolution that would have limited Trump's ability to use deadly military force against alleged narcotics traffickers after Democrats tried to oppose the government's extraordinary use of the armed forces to destroy boats in the Caribbean Sea.
- During the White House "political discussion" on Wednesday, at least one witness repeated Trump's false claim 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.
