WASHINGTON, D.C. – After President Trump threatened to deploy U.S. military troops to “dominate” demonstrators protesting police brutality, U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) helped introduce legislation to restrict the President’s authority under the Insurrection Act, and will work to include it in the upcoming National Defense Authorization Act to ensure that the military is not weaponized by the President to suppress Americans’ free expression.
The CIVIL Act, led by Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), would reform the centuries-old Insurrection Act, which gives the President broad and vague authority to deploy troops – either with or without the request of a state – to suppress “any insurrection, domestic violence, unlawful combination, or conspiracy.”
“Yesterday, I led a group of Senators voicing grave concerns over President Trump’s recent threat to invoke the Insurrection Act in response to Americans exercising their first amendment rights, peacefully protesting in their communities, and calling for racial justice.
Today, I am supporting the CIVIL Act because we cannot allow President Trump to weaponize our military and use active duty troops to violate the constitutional rights of peaceful protesters working to bring about the change our nation desperately needs,” said Senator Baldwin.
The CIVIL Act would reform the Insurrection Act to restrict the President’s authority to use active duty troops for domestic law enforcement purposes by:
