Republican senators are trying to put the brakes on talk of invoking the Insurrection Act to quell angry protests against immigration officers in Minneapolis after one fatally shot Renee Good, a 37-year-old mother of three.
Invoking the law, which was last updated in 1874, would allow President Trump to mobilize active-duty troops or federalized National Guard troops to the streets of Minneapolis amid growing civil unrest over actions by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers.
GOP lawmakers are leery of the prospect of sending a wave of troops to Minneapolis when television and online news in recent days have been dominated by images of masked ICE officers, wearing helmets and ballistic-resistant vests, engaged in heated exchanges with protesters.
Asked if invoking the Insurrection Act to deploy troops to Minneapolis to quell the protests would be appropriate, Senate Armed Services Committee Chair Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) responded, “Probably not.”
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) said the administration needs to be “very careful” to lower the potential for conflict with local communities during ICE law enforcement operations.
“I have felt that since the fatal shooting [of Good] a week or so ago that we needed to be very, very careful, very cautious in how we proceed, not only in Minnesota but in other areas, to keep the conflict — the potential for conflict as it relates to ICE enforcement — dialed back,” she said.
“I’ve said several times that this feels like a climate that we went through during the time of George Floyd,” she added, referring to the Black Lives Matter protests that swept the country in 2020 after the death of George Floyd, a Black man, during a confrontation with police in Minneapolis.
“Everything was just so tenuous and so volatile. We don’t need that,” she added.
Tensions on the streets of Minneapolis have boiled over since Good was shot in the head by an ICE officer last week after she failed to comply with an order to exit her vehicle, which was partially blocking a street during an ICE operation.
She put her car into reverse and then into drive as one ICE officer tried to open her locked driver’s-side door and another stood partly in front her vehicle.
The Trump administration announced Monday that it would send 1,000 additional immigration officers to Minnesota to dramatically expand the federal law enforcement presence in the state.
On Thursday, Trump threatened to trigger the Insurrection Act, if Minnesota public officials didn’t crack down on protesters who have tried to disrupt ICE operations.
“If the corrupt politicians of Minnesota don’t obey the law and stop the professional agitators and insurrectionists from attacking the Patriots of I.C.E., who are only trying to do their job, I will institute the INSURRECTION ACT, which many Presidents have done before me, and quickly put an end to the travesty that is taking place in that once great State,” he posted on Truth Social.
The more-than-200-year-old law was last invoked in 1992 to restore the peace during the riots that broke out after a jury acquitted four Los Angeles Police Department officers of using excessive force in arresting Rodney King, a Black man. The beating of King was captured in a video that inflamed racial tensions in the city. In that instance, however, use of the law came at the request of California’s governor.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) called for cooler heads to prevail when asked about Trump’s threat to trigger the Insurrection Act.
“I think that we need to calm the country down, not head further toward chaos,” he said.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) tried to downplay Trump’s threat but called on local officials to work with law enforcement to “settle things down.”
“I think he’s threatened that [in] other places, other states too. We’ll see what happens there. Hopefully the local officials working with not only the federal law enforcement, ICE and other agencies, but also the local law enforcement officials will be able to settle things down,” he said.
Usually, the Posse Comitatus Act forbids federal armed forces from being deployed for domestic policing actions.
The president may deploy troops to impose order domestically, however, if certain conditions are met.
The law allows the president to deploy troops without a request from the state in order to enforce the laws or to suppress rebellion, according to an analysis by the Brennan Center for Justice.
GOP lawmakers broadly support Trump’s immigration policies and voted to give the Department of Homeland Security a huge infusion of spending in the One Big, Beautiful Bill Act last year.
Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said he would need to “research the law” to respond to Trump’s threat to invoke the Insurrection Act but he expressed frustration over protesters’ tactics in Minnesota.
“Something’s got to be done, though. People who are baiting these ICE agents, people who are blocking their way, people who are burning Christmas trees, people who are spitting in their face, people who are blowing whistles in their ears, need [to] stop,” he said.
But Kennedy acknowledged some ICE officers may have acted unprofessionally.
“I’m not saying every single ICE agent is blameless,” he said. “Whether you agree or disagree with the issue … illegal immigration is illegal.”
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) said the Trump administration appears poised to send troops to Minnesota.
“I read a really interesting thread … laying out exactly how the Trump administration has laid down all the markers, done all the precursor steps to actually [invoking the act]. I certainly hope it doesn’t come to that,” he said. “I hope the radical left will stop obstructing these lawful enforcement actions.”