Greetings and welcome to the current developments in US politics. We begin with the news that a small number of National Guard troops has begun guarding government facilities 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 operating in the Greater Chicago region, according to a representative for the US Northern Command, who spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity in order to discuss mission specifics that have not been officially released.
The military personnel are in the city to secure US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) buildings and other government properties and law enforcement personnel, Northern Command said online.
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 500 troops are under the Northern Command and have been deployed for two months. The official wasn't able to immediately offer information about how the troops were armed.
Political Context
It comes as Donald Trump on Wednesday demanded the imprisonment of Brandon Johnson, Chicago's mayor, and JB Pritzker, the Illinois governor, accusing them of not protecting US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers.
"Chicago Mayor should be in jail for not protecting ICE personnel!" Trump wrote on his social media platform on Wednesday morning. "Governor Pritzker also!"
Both the mayor and governor are members of the Democratic party. Trump's comments coincide with national guard troops have started deployment in the Chicago area at the direction of the Trump administration, despite objections from Illinois officials, including the governor and mayor.
Additional Developments
- The president announced that the conflicting parties have agreed to a tentative deal to cease hostilities in Gaza, and release captured individuals and Palestinian prisoners.
- News of the Gaza agreement was applauded by GOP legislators, who urged Trump to be given the Nobel Peace prize this week, but greeted with more trepidation by Palestinian Americans.
- During presidential gathering, Trump seemed unfamiliar with the term 'Habeas Corpus' and referred to Kristi Noem. In May, Noem gave a wildly inaccurate definition of the core legal principle that mandates that the authorities provide a public reason for detaining and imprisoning people.
- All of the participants who contributed testimony at the White House "antifa roundtable" hosted by the president on Wednesday were identified as freelance reporters who might better be called partisan conservative social media influencers. The influencers report on leftwing protests in a partisan fashion, more akin to political investigation than nonpartisan reporting.
- GOP senators voted down 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 oppose the government's unprecedented deployment of the armed forces to destroy boats in the Caribbean Sea.
- During the White House "political discussion" on Wednesday, at least a participant echoed Trump's false claim that large numbers of people have been murdered by left-wing radicals in the Oregon city. The accurate count of killings by political activists in Portland is: a single incident.
