President Donald J. Trump stands with United States Naval Academy cadets during the 120th Army-Navy Game at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia, Dec. 14, 2019. (James E. Harvey/U.S. Army)
WASHINGTON — Two Democratic senators are calling on President Joe Biden and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to issue a directive prohibiting the mobilization of active-duty troops against Americans before President-elect Donald Trump returns to power.
Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., said they want protections in place in case Trump makes good on his threat to root out “the enemy from within” by utilizing the National Guard, “or if really necessary, by the military.”
The senators said they fear Trump will invoke the Insurrection Act beyond its legal limits in a quest to target political opponents. The law allows the president to deploy military personnel within U.S. borders in narrow circumstances of insurrection, rebellion or extreme civil unrest.
“As many of us wrote previously, ‘it is antithetical to what those in uniform have sworn to protect and defend, and a serious threat to our democratic system’ to weaponize the military to advance the president’s political interests,’ ” the senators wrote in a letter to Biden and Austin on Sunday.
During his first term, Trump came close to putting active-duty troops on the streets of Washington to tamp down racial justice protests in 2020. Active-duty units were deployed to the outskirts of the capital before the defense secretary at the time, Mark Esper, sent them home without telling the White House.
“I couldn’t trust they wouldn’t reverse my decision,” Esper later wrote in his book.
He also wrote that Trump “launched into a tirade” and accused his defense secretary of betrayal after Esper told reporters he did not support using the Insurrection Act to stamp out the unrest.
Warren and Blumenthal said Sunday that a new policy directive must make clear that the Insurrection Act should only be used in instances “when state or local authorities are so overwhelmed and that the chief executive of the state requests assistance or attacks against the U.S. government overwhelm state or local authorities.”
The directive should also state that the president must consult with Congress to the “maximum extent practicable” before invoking the act, the senators wrote.
They urged Biden and Austin to shore up guidelines as soon as possible given the uncertainty created by a recent Supreme Court decision on presidential immunity. The court ruled in July that occupants of the Oval Office are entitled to “a presumptive immunity from prosecution” for all their official acts.
The implications of the decision are unclear, according to scholars, and Warren and Blumenthal said they are worried confusion could spill over to the military. Service members are obligated to reject unlawful orders, but “it is reasonable to assume” that they may not be fully aware of their rights and responsibilities, the senators said.
“If unaddressed, any ambiguity on the lawful use of military force, coupled with President-elect Trump’s demonstrated intent to utilize the military in such dangerous and unprecedented ways, may prove to be devastating,” Warren and Blumenthal wrote.
