Greetings and welcome to the latest developments in American political affairs. We start with the news that a small number of National Guard troops has started protecting 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 operating in the Greater Chicago region, according to a spokesperson for the US Northern Command, who communicated with the Associated Press on background basis in order to discuss operational details that have not been officially released.
The troops are in the urban area to protect US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities and other federal facilities and law enforcement personnel, Northern Command said online.
The troops, along with about three hundred Illinois personnel, 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 activated for two months. The official wasn't able to immediately offer details 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 state governor, charging them of failing to protect US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) personnel.
"The city's mayor should be in prison for not protecting Ice Officers!" Trump wrote on Truth Social on Wednesday morning. "The state governor also!"
Both the mayor and governor are Democrats. Trump's comments come as state military forces have started deployment in the Greater Chicago region at the direction of the Trump administration, despite objections from Illinois officials, including Pritzker and Johnson.
Additional Developments
- Donald Trump announced that Hamas and Israel have accepted a provisional agreement to cease hostilities in Gaza, and release Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners.
- Reports about the Middle East deal was praised by GOP legislators, who urged Trump to be given the peace award this week, but received with greater caution by Palestinian Americans.
- During presidential gathering, Trump seemed unfamiliar with the term 'legal principle' and deferred to his homeland security secretary. In May, Noem gave a highly incorrect definition of the core legal principle that requires that the government provide a public reason for arresting and jailing people.
- All of the witnesses who provided statements at the White House "political discussion" 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 partisan fashion, more similar to opposition research than nonpartisan reporting.
- Senate Republicans rejected a war powers resolution that would have limited Trump's authority to use deadly military force against suspected drug smugglers after Democrats tried to oppose 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 a participant repeated Trump's inaccurate statement that significant amounts of people have been killed by political extremists in the Oregon city. The accurate count of killings by self-described "antifa" radicals in Portland is: one.
