Hello and welcome to the current updates in US politics. We begin with the news that a small number of National Guard troops has begun guarding federal property in the Greater Chicago region and supporting police operations in Memphis on Wednesday, according to officials.
Deployment Details
An unit of 200 Texas Guard troops were operating in the Greater Chicago region, as stated by 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 officially released.
The military personnel are in the urban area to protect US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities and other federal facilities and law enforcement personnel, Northern Command stated publicly.
The forces, 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 military command and have been deployed 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 demanded the imprisonment of Brandon Johnson, Chicago's mayor, and JB Pritzker, the state governor, accusing them of not protecting US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) personnel.
"Chicago Mayor should be in prison for not protecting ICE personnel!" Trump wrote on his social media platform on Wednesday morning. "Governor Pritzker also!"
Both Johnson and Pritzker are Democrats. Trump's comments come as national guard troops have begun arriving in the Greater Chicago region at the order of the Trump administration, despite opposition from state authorities, including Pritzker and Johnson.
Additional Developments
- Donald Trump declared that Hamas and Israel have accepted a tentative deal to cease hostilities in Gaza, and release captured individuals and detained persons.
- News of the Gaza agreement was applauded by Republican lawmakers, who called on Trump to be given the Nobel Peace prize 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, Noem gave a highly incorrect explanation of the fundamental legal concept that requires that the authorities provide a public reason for detaining and imprisoning people.
- All of the participants who provided statements at the White House "antifa roundtable" organized by the president on Wednesday were identified as freelance reporters who might better be called partisan conservative social media influencers. The influencers cover leftwing protests in a highly political manner, more akin to political investigation than nonpartisan reporting.
- Senate Republicans rejected a war powers resolution that would have checked Trump's authority to use deadly military force against suspected drug smugglers after Democrats tried to counter the administration's unprecedented deployment of the military to destroy boats in the Caribbean.
- During the White House "antifa roundtable" on Wednesday, at least one witness repeated Trump's inaccurate statement that significant amounts of people have been murdered by political extremists in the Oregon city. The accurate count of fatal incidents by political activists in Portland is: a single incident.
