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What is the Insurrection Act — and why Trump’s threat to invoke it in Minnesota is rare
President Trump has threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act, a seldom-used 19th-century law that could let him deploy U.S. troops to quell protests in Minneapolis over federal immigration enforcement and ICE-related shootings. The act has only been invoked about 30 times in U.S. history — most recently during the 1992 Los Angeles riots — and legal experts say its use now raises constitutional questions amid disputes with Minnesota officials.
CHICAGO - The Insurrection Act has only been invoked a few dozen times in the entire history of the nation.
President Donald Trump has previously suggested he could invoke the Insurrection Act but appeared to escalate those threats Thursday in social media posts.
Trump threatened federal action if Minnesota officials do not do more to quell unrest following another shooting involving a federal agent.
What we know:
According to University of Illinois Chicago legal scholar Steven Schwinn, the act has been invoked about 30 times in U.S. history, most recently during the 1992 Rodney King riots in Los Angeles, when it was used with the cooperation of California’s governor.
Schwinn said the law allows the president to deploy federal troops or federalized National Guard members into U.S. cities, but he emphasized that invoking the act is not the same as declaring martial law.
"If the president invokes the Insurrection Act, the president can order military authorities and National Guard to enforce federal law themselves, directly. That's part of the strength of the Insurrection Act. Having said that, the Insurrection Act itself doesn't authorize the president to order the military to create a kind of martial law situation," Schwinn said.
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison has said he would sue to block the use of the act if it is invoked. Schwinn noted that federal law is not entirely clear about what legally constitutes an insurrection and that courts would likely defer to the president’s judgment.
The act was also used during the civil rights movement of the 1960s to enforce the integration of public schools over the objections of Southern governors.
Some legal scholars have theorized that aggressive immigration enforcement in Democratic-led cities could lead to confrontations that might be used as justification to invoke the act. However, Schwinn said the images coming out of Minnesota, while dramatic, do not appear to rise to that level.
"The courts are going to defer heavily to the judgment of the president in this regard, but based on everything that I've seen coming out of Minneapolis and Minnesota more generally, there's no call for invoking the Insurrection Act here. The triggers just are not implicated. There's no rebellion, there's no insurrection, there's nothing even close to that. And moreover to the extent that there is violence or unrest in Minneapolis… many would argue it's the federal government's own doing," he said.
What's next:
The Insurrection Act was invoked in Chicago in the late 1800s to break a nationwide railroad workers strike that began in the Pullman neighborhood.
The Source: The information in this article was reported by FOX Chicago's Paris Schutz.