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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 begun guarding federal property in the Chicago area and assisting law enforcement in Memphis on Wednesday, according to officials.

Deployment Details

An unit of 200 Texas Guard troops were working in the Chicago area, according to a spokesperson for the US Northern Command, who spoke to the news agency on condition of anonymity in order to reveal mission specifics that have not been officially released.

The troops are in the urban area to protect US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) buildings and other federal facilities and police officers, Northern Command stated publicly.

The forces, along with about 300 from Illinois, had reached on 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 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 failing to protect US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) personnel.

"The city's mayor should be in prison for not protecting Ice Officers!" Trump posted on his social media platform on Wednesday morning. "The state governor also!"

Both Johnson and Pritzker are Democrats. Trump's remarks come as state military forces have started deployment in the Chicago area at the direction of the Trump administration, despite opposition from state authorities, including Pritzker and Johnson.

Other Updates

• The president declared that the conflicting parties have agreed to a provisional agreement to cease hostilities in Gaza, and free captured individuals and detained persons.
• News of the Gaza agreement was praised by Republican lawmakers, who called on Trump to be awarded 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 referred to his homeland security secretary. In May, Noem gave a wildly inaccurate explanation of the fundamental legal concept that requires that the government provide a public reason for arresting and jailing people.
• All of the participants who contributed testimony at the White House "antifa roundtable" hosted by the president on Wednesday were self-described independent journalists who might better be called partisan conservative social media influencers. The content producers report on liberal demonstrations in a partisan fashion, more similar to opposition research than neutral journalism.
• GOP senators voted down a war powers resolution that would have limited Trump's authority to use deadly military force against suspected drug smugglers after opposition party tried to counter the government's unprecedented deployment 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 large numbers of people have been murdered by left-wing radicals in the Oregon city. The correct number of killings by self-described "antifa" radicals in Portland is: a single incident.