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Greetings and welcome to the current developments in American political affairs. We start 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, as confirmed by authorities.

Deployment Details

An unit of 200 Texas Guard troops were working in the Greater Chicago region, as stated by 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 troops, along with about 300 from Illinois, had reached on 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 spokesperson wasn't able to quickly provide information about how the personnel were equipped.

Political Context

It comes as Donald Trump on Wednesday called for the jailing of Brandon Johnson, Chicago's city leader, and JB Pritzker, the Illinois governor, charging them of failing to protect US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers.

"Chicago Mayor should be in prison for failing to protect Ice Officers!" Trump wrote on his social media platform on Wednesday morning. "Governor Pritzker also!"

Both the mayor and governor are Democrats. Trump's remarks come as state military forces have begun arriving in the Greater Chicago region at the direction of the Trump administration, despite objections from Illinois officials, including the governor and mayor.

Additional Developments

• Donald Trump declared that Hamas and Israel have accepted a provisional agreement to cease hostilities in Gaza, and free captured individuals and detained persons.
• Reports about the Gaza agreement 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 deferred to Kristi Noem. In May, Noem gave a wildly inaccurate explanation of the fundamental legal concept that mandates that the government provide a official justification for arresting and jailing people.
• All of the participants who provided statements at the White House "political discussion" hosted by the president on Wednesday were self-described independent journalists who might better be called partisan conservative social media influencers. The influencers cover liberal demonstrations in a partisan fashion, more akin to political investigation 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 Democrats tried to oppose the administration's unprecedented deployment of the armed forces to destroy boats in the Caribbean.
• During the White House "antifa roundtable" on Wednesday, at least one witness echoed Trump's false claim that large numbers of people have been murdered by political extremists in the Oregon city. The correct number of killings by self-described "antifa" radicals in Portland is: one.