Hello 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 federal property in the Chicago area and assisting law enforcement in Memphis on Wednesday, according to officials.
Troop Information
An element of 200 Texas Guard troops were working in the Chicago area, as stated by a spokesperson for the US Northern Command, who communicated with the news agency on background basis in order to reveal operational details that have not been made public.
The military personnel are in the urban area to protect US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities and other federal facilities and police officers, Northern Command said online.
The troops, along with about three hundred Illinois personnel, had arrived Tuesday at a US Army Reserve Center in Elwood, 55 miles southwest of Chicago. All five hundred personnel are under the Northern Command and have been activated for 60 days. The spokesperson wasn't able to quickly provide information about how the troops were armed.
Political Context
It comes as Donald Trump on Wednesday called for the jailing 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 failing to protect Ice Officers!" Trump posted on Truth Social on Wednesday morning. "Governor Pritzker also!"
Both Johnson and Pritzker are Democrats. Trump's remarks come as national guard troops have begun arriving in the Greater Chicago region at the direction of the federal administration, despite opposition from Illinois officials, including Pritzker and Johnson.
Other Updates
- Donald Trump announced that Hamas and Israel have accepted a provisional agreement to cease hostilities in Gaza, and release captured individuals and Palestinian prisoners.
- Reports about the Gaza agreement was praised by GOP legislators, who called on Trump to be given the peace award this week, but greeted with more trepidation by Palestinian Americans.
- During presidential gathering, Trump seemed unfamiliar with the term 'Habeas Corpus' and deferred to his homeland security secretary. In May, Noem gave a wildly inaccurate definition of the core legal principle that requires 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 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 akin to political investigation than nonpartisan reporting.
- Senate Republicans rejected a military authorization measure that would have limited Trump's ability to use deadly military force against alleged narcotics traffickers after opposition party tried to counter the administration's unprecedented deployment of the armed forces to eliminate vessels in the Caribbean Sea.
- During the White House "political discussion" on Wednesday, at least a participant repeated Trump's inaccurate statement that large numbers of people have been murdered by political extremists in Portland, Oregon. The accurate count of killings by political activists in Portland is: a single incident.
