President Donald Trump‘s administration will on Sunday learn whether a report by its top officials recommends using the Insurrection Act in response to immigration concerns.
Since assuming office, Trump has made curbing illegal immigration a top priority and has dispatched troops to the southern U.S. border to support Customs and Border Patrol operations.
To a similar end, January, Trump issued an executive order declaring a border emergency and requesting a report from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem within 90 days on whether to invoke the act.
The request said he wanted a “joint report to the president about the conditions at the southern border of the United States and any recommendations regarding additional actions that may be necessary to obtain complete operational control of the southern border, including whether to invoke the Insurrection Act of 1807.”
Former Assistant Attorney General for Virginia Gene Rossi told Newsweek that Trump was likely to invoke the act.
“Emboldened with a second term and a popular vote victory, President Trump will likely invoke the Insurrection Act for immigration and other purposes,” he said.
“That these likely invocations, if any, will come from a convicted felon with his own J6 insurrection tendencies means that we are entering ‘1984’ territory that would make George Orwell pea-green with envy.”
Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, with the president facing accusations of having incited the insurrection, which he has always strongly denied.
AP Photo/Alex Brandon
What is the Insurrection Act?
The 19th-century statute, would allow the use of active-duty military personnel to perform law-enforcement duties within the United States, including arresting migrants. It is a combination of different laws enacted by Congress between 1792 and 1871.
It has not been used often and in the past was invoked by President Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War and by President Ulysses S. Grant against the Ku Klux Klan.
President Dwight D. Eisenhower used it to order federal troops to escort Black students into Little Rock Central High School after Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus refused to comply with a federal desegregation order.
It was also used by President George H.W. Bush during the 1992 riots in Los Angeles that left 63 dead, around 2,300 injured and more than 12,000 arrested.
What Will Hegseth and Noem Recommend?
Despite Trump’s wishes, Hegseth and Noem are not expected to recommend invoking the act, according to CNN. The expected recommendation says that migrant crossings have significantly decreased—under 300 per day, compared to well over 1,000 in previous years—and that current levels are sufficient for managing the situation.
According to CNN, officials have given warnings that invoking the act could overwhelm current detention capacities.
However, administration officials have not officially confirmed whether or not they will recommend the act being invoked.
“At the president’s direction, the DHS and DOD [Department of Defense] are developing a joint report assessing the conditions at the U.S. southern border and recommending actions to achieve full operational control of the border,” the DHS said in a statement issued to the press.