Trump threatens to mobilize military to suppress violent protests over George Floyd
President Donald Trump on Monday threatened to deploy thousands of active duty military forces across the United States if cities do not clamp down on violence in protests that have raged across the nation in response to the death of George Floyd.
He started outside the White House, where protesters, sometimes violent, had gathered well into the night over the weekend. On Monday, as a demonstration that had been peaceful approached a citywide curfew, Trump ordered law enforcement personnel to disperse the crowd, and walked to a nearby church scarred by a fire the night before.
“I am taking immediate presidential action to stop the violence and restore security and safety in America,” Trump said from the Rose Garden, before walking to St. John’s Church. “I am mobilizing all available federal resources, civilian and military, to stop the rioting and looting, to end the destruction and arson, and to protect the rights of law-abiding Americans.”
The president spoke while hundreds of protesters confronted rows of D.C. police who fired tear gas, some mounted on horseback, and D.C. National Guard members carrying shields that read “Military Police” just outside the White House.
Their voices, and the sounds of explosions as the demonstration dispersed, could be heard as the president spoke from the White House complex, where Trump promised to be the “president of law and order and an ally of peaceful protesters.”
“What happened in the city last night was a total disgrace,” Trump said, claiming the nation had been “gripped by professional anarchists, violent mobs, arsonists, looters, criminals, rioters, antifa, and others.”
“As we speak, I am dispatching thousands and thousands of heavily armed soldiers, military personnel and law enforcement officers to stop the rioting, looting, vandalism, assaults, and the wanton destruction of property,” he said.
Those forces include more than 1,200 D.C. National Guard members with additional guard forces from five states set to arrive before midnight.
In addition, the Pentagon had already ordered 250 active duty military police from Fort Bragg, N.C., but emphasized they were not being deployed into the nation’s capital and were not going to be used for any law enforcement activities at this time.
Active duty forces under federal control are explicitly prohibited from engaging in law enforcement on U.S. soil – unless the president invokes a rarely used law, which Trump threatened to do on Monday.
INVOKING ‘INSURRECTION’
Active duty forces cannot conduct law enforcement activity on U.S. soil unless the president invokes the Insurrection Act.
“At this time the Insurrection Act has not been invoked,” one senior defense official said.
Trump suggested he would invoke the act if city and state governments across the United States did not dispatch additional Guard forces on their own to “dominate” the violent protesters. The act, however, requires that states request military assistance.
“If a city or state refuses to take the actions that are necessary to defend the life and property of their residents then I will deploy the United States military and quickly solve the problem for them,” Trump said.
Previous administrations have invoked the Insurrection Act, said Larry Korb, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress who served as an assistant secretary of defense under former President Ronald Reagan.
“We have, throughout our history, used the active duty military” to stop rioting, Korb said, citing the 1992 riots that followed the acquittal of police officers videotaped beating Rodney King in Los Angeles, and the Detroit riots in 1967.
The White House announced on Monday it was establishing a command cell to coordinate the military’s response in D.C.
The cell is being led by Army Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Defense Secretary Mark Esper, Maj. Gen. William Walker, the Commanding General of the District of Columbia National Guard, Attorney General William Barr, and the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia.
Earlier in the day, the White House had suggested that all National Guard – who are currently under the control of their state governors – might also be put under the control of Milley, which would be unprecedented. The senior defense officials on the media call said Milley would not assume control over the activated Guard forces.
“General Milley is an adviser. His role has not changed, his authorities have not changed,” one of the senior defense officials said. “We are not nationalizing the National Guard forces.”
As of Monday more than 17,000 National Guard members had been activated in 23 states and the District of Columbia in response to the protests. The vast majority of those forces are under the control of their state governors.
However, in a recording of a call between Trump and governors Monday, that was obtained by The Washington Post, Esper called the protests on U.S. soil a “battlespace,” further raising questions as to whether U.S. forces would be put under federal control to use force against U.S. citizens.
“At my urging, I agree, we need to dominate the battlespace,” Esper told the governors. “I stand ready, the chairman stands ready, the head of the National Guard stands ready to help you in terms of helping mobilize the Guard and doing what they need to do,” he said.
A senior defense official told McClatchy on the condition of not being identified that Esper’s use of the word was simply to advise the governors they had to add more law enforcement.
“The use of ‘battlespace’ – it’s just a phrase we use – the space in which we are operating,” the senior defense official said. “It does not mean the militarization of this at all.”
Cities across the country braced for another night of protests on Monday after a weekend of both peaceful and violent demonstrations gripped the nation over Floyd, a black man who died after a white Minneapolis police officer knelt on his neck. In Washington, cars were burned, stores were looted and historic landmarks were defaced within sight of the president’s residence.
Inside the White House, only essential personnel reported to work, and those who showed in person left before dark.
District of Columbia Mayor Muriel Bowser declared a citywide curfew for 7 p.m. – a curfew that Trump said would be strictly enforced. In his call with governors, Trump said that “we are going to clamp down very, very strong” in the nation’s capital, dismissing Bowser’s efforts to direct local police.
“If you don’t dominate your city and your state, they’re going to walk away with you. And we’re doing it in Washington, in D.C., we’re going to do something that people haven’t seen before. We’re going to have total domination,” he said.
“It’s a movement that, if you don’t put it down, it’ll get worse and worse,” Trump said.
States across the country experiencing mass protests since last week have called in National Guard units to help assist their largest cities. Trump urged governors to act more aggressively to control their streets with law enforcement, and criticized them for not using the Guardsmen in greater numbers.
“The secretary of defense is here. We’re strongly looking for arrests. We do have to get much tougher. You’re going to get overridden,” Trump told the governors. “We have all the men and women that you need, but people aren’t calling them up. You have to dominate. If you don’t dominate, you’re wasting your time. They’re going to run over you – you’re going to look like a bunch of jerks.”
Francesca Chambers contributed reporting.
Updates with Trump remarks, defense official comments
This story was originally published June 1, 2020 at 3:08 PM with the headline "Trump threatens to mobilize military to suppress violent protests over George Floyd."
