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Hello and welcome to the latest updates in American political affairs. We start with the news that a small number of state military forces has started protecting federal property in the Chicago area and assisting law enforcement in Memphis on Wednesday, according to officials.

Deployment Details

An unit of two hundred Texas military personnel were operating in the Chicago area, according to a spokesperson for the US Northern Command, who communicated with the news agency on background basis in order to discuss operational details that have not been made public.

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

The forces, 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 military command and have been deployed for two months. The official wasn't able to immediately offer information about how the personnel were equipped.

Political Context

It comes as Donald Trump on Wednesday demanded the imprisonment 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 failing to protect ICE personnel!" Trump posted on Truth Social on Wednesday morning. "The state governor also!"

Both Johnson and Pritzker are members of the Democratic party. Trump's comments coincide with state military forces have begun arriving in the Chicago area at the direction of the federal administration, despite opposition from Illinois officials, including the governor and mayor.

Other Updates

• Donald Trump announced that Hamas and Israel have accepted a tentative deal to end the fighting in Gaza, and free captured individuals and Palestinian prisoners.
• Reports about the Middle East deal was praised by GOP legislators, who urged Trump to be awarded the Nobel Peace prize this week, but received with greater caution by Palestinian Americans.
• During White House event, Trump seemed unfamiliar with the term 'legal principle' and referred to his homeland security secretary. In May, the secretary gave a wildly inaccurate 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 "political discussion" organized by the administration on Wednesday were self-described independent journalists who might better be called partisan conservative social media influencers. The content producers cover liberal demonstrations in a partisan fashion, more similar to opposition research than neutral journalism.
• Senate Republicans voted down a war powers resolution that would have checked Trump's ability to use lethal armed action against alleged narcotics traffickers after Democrats tried to oppose the administration's extraordinary use of the military to destroy boats in the Caribbean.
• During the White House "antifa roundtable" on Wednesday, at least a participant repeated Trump's false claim that large numbers of people have been killed by political extremists in Portland, Oregon. The accurate count of fatal incidents by self-described "antifa" radicals in Portland is: one.