Hello and welcome to the latest developments in US politics. We begin with the report that a limited contingent of state military forces has begun guarding government facilities in the Chicago area and supporting police operations in Memphis on Wednesday, according to officials.
Troop Information
An unit of 200 Texas Guard troops were working in the Chicago area, according to a spokesperson for the US Northern Command, who spoke to the news agency on background basis in order to discuss operational details that have not been made public.
The military personnel are in the city to protect US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities and other federal facilities and police officers, Northern Command stated publicly.
The troops, along with about 300 from Illinois, 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 activated for two months. The official wasn't able to immediately offer information about how the personnel were equipped.
Political Context
It coincides with Donald Trump on Wednesday demanded the jailing of Brandon Johnson, Chicago's mayor, and JB Pritzker, the Illinois 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. "The state governor also!"
Both Johnson and Pritzker are Democrats. Trump's remarks coincide with national guard troops have begun arriving in the Greater Chicago region at the order of the federal administration, despite opposition from Illinois officials, including Pritzker and Johnson.
Other Updates
- The president announced that the conflicting parties have accepted a tentative deal to cease hostilities in Gaza, and free captured individuals and detained persons.
- Reports about the Middle East deal was applauded by Republican lawmakers, who called on Trump to be given the peace award this week, but received with greater caution by Palestinian Americans.
- During White House event, Trump seemed unfamiliar with the term 'Habeas Corpus' and deferred to his homeland security secretary. In May, the secretary gave a highly incorrect definition of the fundamental legal concept that mandates that the government provide a official justification for detaining and imprisoning people.
- All of the witnesses who provided statements at the White House "antifa roundtable" hosted by the administration on Wednesday were identified as freelance reporters who might better be called political content creators. The content producers cover liberal demonstrations in a partisan fashion, more akin to political investigation than nonpartisan reporting.
- GOP senators voted down a military authorization measure that would have checked Trump's authority to use deadly military force against alleged narcotics traffickers after opposition party tried to counter the government's extraordinary use of the military to eliminate vessels in the Caribbean Sea.
- During the White House "political discussion" on Wednesday, at least one witness echoed Trump's false claim that large numbers of people have been killed by left-wing radicals in Portland, Oregon. The correct number of killings by self-described "antifa" radicals in Portland is: a single incident.
