As protesters and federal regulation enforcement clashed in Minneapolis within the wake of a 2nd taking pictures of a civilian on Jan. 14, 2026 via federal brokers, President Donald Trump threatened to invoke the Rebel Act to ship troops to Minnesota in keeping with protests.
This isn’t the primary time Trump has invoked the act.
Is Trump’s caution simply bluster? Does the president have the authority to ship the army into American towns?
The solution to this query comes to a internet of felony provisions that lend a hand outline the president’s constitutional roles as commander in leader and leader govt of the rustic and that concurrently attempt to steadiness presidential energy with the facility of state leaders.
A social media submit from January 15, 2026 via President Donald Trump, threatening to make use of the Rebel Act to ship U.S. army to Minneapolis.
Fact Social Donald Trump account
‘Protect states in times of violence’
Tracing again to the Magna Carta, the British constitution of liberty signed in 1215, there’s a longstanding custom towards army involvement in civilian affairs.
Then again, the U.S. Charter promises that the nationwide executive will offer protection to the states in instances of violence and lets in Congress to enact rules that permit the army to help in wearing out the regulation.
Nearly straight away after the Charter’s enactment in 1787, Congress handed a regulation that allowed the president to make use of the army to reply to a sequence of citizen rebellions.
Troops serving as what’s known as “posse comitatus,” which interprets kind of to “attendants with the capacity to act,” may well be known as to suppress insurrections and lend a hand perform federal rules.
Using troops on this way will also have influenced the result of the 1876 presidential election of Republican Rutherford B. Hayes. That came about when, in go back for agreeing to withdraw federal troops from the South, Democrats informally agreed to the election of Hayes when the disputed election was once thrown to a congressional fee.
Two years later, Hayes signed into regulation the Posse Comitatus Act, which prohibited the usage of the army in civilian issues.
The Posse Comitatus Act has now not modified a lot since that point. The regulation prohibits the usage of the army in civilian issues however, over the years, Congress has handed no less than 26 exemptions to the act that permit the president to ship troops into states.
The exemptions vary from offering army group of workers to give protection to nationwide parks to serving to states in wearing out state quarantine and well being rules.
Army troops arrive in Los Angeles to revive order after rioting befell within the wake of the decision within the Rodney King case in 1992.
Peter Turnley/Corbis/VCG by means of Getty Pictures
Rebel Act
Any such exemptions is the Rebel Act, which governs positive instances when the president can use the army. Signed via Thomas Jefferson in 1807, Congress in the beginning handed the regulation with the intention to lend a hand battle citizen rebellions towards federal taxes.
Over the years, the regulation has developed to permit the usage of troops in different instances. As an example, Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy and Johnson used the Rebel Act within the Nineteen Fifties and Nineteen Sixties to ship the army to implement courtroom desegregation orders and to give protection to civil rights marchers.
It was once ultimate invoked via President George H.W. Bush in 1992, when he ordered 4,500 troops to Los Angeles after rioting erupted in keeping with the acquittal of law enforcement officials charged with beating Rodney King.
The Rebel Act says that the president might use the military to subdue an revolt or rebel and take such measures as he considers important to suppress violence.
However sooner than doing so, he should factor a proclamation ordering insurgents to disperse and go back to their properties.
Whilst state governors and legislatures even have the felony authority to invite the president to make use of troops on this way, the states have most well-liked to depend on a mixture of native regulation enforcement and the Nationwide Guard, which is below state command, now not federal.
No longer handiest does this technique permit governors to care for authority over their states, nevertheless it additionally assists in keeping issues easier legally and politically.
After President Trump’s risk in 2020 to ship troops to quell violence, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, heart, advised CNN ‘I reject the notion that the federal government can send troops into the state of Illinois.’
Chris Sweda-Pool by means of Getty Pictures
In December 2025, the Excellent Court docket refused to let President Trump deploy the Nationwide Guard in keeping with protests towards ICE in Illinois. But in a concurring opinion, Justice Brett Kavanagh famous, “As I read it, the Court’s opinion does not address the President’s authority under the Insurrection Act.”
Authority unsure
Reliance at the Rebel Act raises a number of felony, political and sensible questions on who’s in price when the army sends troops right into a state.
As an example, although the act was once invoked in keeping with the Rodney King riots, the army in truth was once now not used as directed. The Joint Job Pressure Commander in keep watch over of the challenge seems to had been at a loss for words referring to how the Rebel Act labored along the provisions of the Posse Comitatus Act. He issued an order prohibiting troops from at once supporting regulation enforcement and that ended in a large number of denials of requests for help.
Questions concerning the federal executive’s authority within the wake of the 2005 Typhoon Katrina in Louisiana raised equivalent issues.
The management of President George W. Bush decided that it had authority below the Rebel Act to ship federal troops to the realm, although Louisiana’s governor was once antagonistic to army help.
For political causes, President Bush didn’t finally end up deploying troops however, in 2006, Congress amended the regulation to handle issues that the army was once not able to supply efficient help to states in emergency scenarios.
The modification was once later repealed when all 50 state governors raised objections to what they perceived as a grant of unilateral energy to the president.
Those examples recommend an actual issue balancing governmental responses to home crises. States want the versatility and authority to reply as they see have compatibility to the wishes in their electorate.
However the federal executive can and steadily does function a supplemental useful resource. Because the occasions of the previous week illustrate, placing an efficient steadiness is never an easy factor.
This tale is an replace to a tale in the beginning revealed on June 2, 2020.
