🔗 Share this article

Greetings and welcome to the current developments in American political affairs. We begin with the report that a small number of National Guard troops has started protecting federal property in the Chicago area and assisting law enforcement in Memphis on Wednesday, according to officials.

Deployment Details

An element of 200 Texas Guard troops were working in the Greater Chicago region, according to a spokesperson for the US Northern Command, who spoke to the news agency on condition of anonymity in order to discuss operational details that have not been made public.

The troops are in the urban area to protect US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities and other government properties and law enforcement personnel, Northern Command stated publicly.

The troops, along with about 300 from Illinois, 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 60 days. The spokesperson wasn't able to quickly provide details about how the troops were armed.

Background Situation

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) personnel.

"The city's mayor should be in prison for failing to protect Ice Officers!" Trump wrote on his social media platform on Wednesday morning. "The state governor also!"

Both the mayor and governor are Democrats. Trump's remarks come as national guard troops have begun arriving 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 declared that the conflicting parties have agreed to a provisional agreement to end the fighting in Gaza, and release Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners.
• Reports about the Gaza agreement was praised by GOP legislators, who urged Trump to be given the Nobel Peace prize this week, but greeted with more trepidation by Arab-American communities.
• During White House event, Trump appeared not to recognize the term 'legal principle' and referred to Kristi Noem. In May, Noem gave a wildly inaccurate explanation of the core legal principle 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 self-described independent journalists who might better be called political content creators. The influencers cover liberal demonstrations in a highly political manner, more similar to political investigation than nonpartisan reporting.
• GOP senators voted down a war powers resolution that would have limited Trump's authority to use deadly military force against alleged narcotics traffickers after opposition party tried to counter the administration's extraordinary use of the military to eliminate vessels in the Caribbean.
• During the White House "political discussion" on Wednesday, at least one witness repeated Trump's inaccurate statement that significant amounts of people have been killed by left-wing radicals in the Oregon city. The correct number of killings by self-described "antifa" radicals in Portland is: one.