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Hello and welcome to the latest updates in US politics. We begin with the news that a small number of state military forces has started protecting federal property in the Chicago area and supporting police operations in Memphis on Wednesday, according to officials.

Troop Information

An unit 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 reveal mission specifics that have not been made public.

The military personnel are in the city to secure US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) buildings and other federal facilities and police officers, 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 military command and have been deployed for two months. The spokesperson wasn't able to immediately offer information about how the personnel were equipped.

Political Context

It comes as Donald Trump on Wednesday called for the imprisonment 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.

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

Both Johnson and Pritzker are Democrats. Trump's remarks coincide with national guard troops have begun arriving in the Greater Chicago region at the order of the federal administration, despite opposition from state authorities, including Pritzker and Johnson.

Other Updates

• The president announced that Hamas and Israel have agreed to a provisional agreement to end the fighting in Gaza, and free captured individuals and detained persons.
• News of the Middle East deal was applauded by GOP legislators, who urged Trump to be awarded 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 'Habeas Corpus' and deferred to his homeland security secretary. 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 witnesses who provided statements at the White House "antifa roundtable" hosted by the administration on Wednesday were identified as freelance reporters who might more accurately described as political content creators. The content producers report on liberal demonstrations in a highly political manner, more akin to opposition research than nonpartisan reporting.
• Senate Republicans rejected a war powers resolution that would have checked Trump's authority to use lethal armed action against suspected drug smugglers after opposition party tried to oppose the government's unprecedented deployment of the armed forces to eliminate vessels in the Caribbean Sea.
• During the White House "antifa roundtable" on Wednesday, at least a participant echoed Trump's false claim that significant amounts of people have been murdered by left-wing radicals in the Oregon city. The accurate count of fatal incidents by political activists in Portland is: a single incident.