US President Donald Trump has deployed the National Guard in an effort to "liberate" Los Angeles amid protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations. Can the president legally send troops into cities that basically reject them? Yes, says Brent Sadler, a Research Fellow at the right-wing Heritage Foundation think-tank behind "Project 2025."
00:00Can you tell me if the president legally can send troops to the cities that basically reject them?
00:06Yes, there's two laws that are important here.
00:10One is post-accomitatis, which actually was put in place after the Reconstruction efforts, like 10 years after our Civil War in the 1860s.
00:19The bill was passed in 1878, if I'm correct on that.
00:23That actually prevents the military from conducting law enforcement.
00:28That goes back to why we fought a revolution against the British.
00:33So that would take an exception.
00:35That's not in place here.
00:37The military that's being activated is actually not to enforce law, but to protect law enforcement like ICE and the local police forces, but also to defend the federal buildings in the area.
00:49So legal doesn't cross the post-accomitatis law of 1878.
00:53The second law is the Hobbes Act.
00:55Now, that is what they actually – the attorney general is saying that they can actually impose or enforce with criminal sanctions.
01:04And that is when protesters, in this case rioters, more correctly, interfere with commerce, interstate commerce, international commerce, as well as threatening federal buildings and federal agents executing their duties.
01:18So what's most in play here is the Hobbes Act, and that actually goes back to 1946 in trying to prevent protest and racketeering.
01:29So a different type of origin, but does it apply in this case?
01:34Well, hopefully we see if the people don't like the actions that the Trump administration is taking – again, popularly elected – then they should peacefully protest.
01:44But what we've seen in Los Angeles is actually rioting, and that is illegal.
01:49That is not protected by civil rights.
01:51We saw similar problems for protest and vandalism and actually the injuring of several hundred police over the course of almost a year in Portland back in the summer of 2020, and there was no forceful response.
02:05I think the lesson here, and it's an important one, is this type of disregard for law, disregard for the rules of a democratic society here in the United States, are not going to be supported by ignoring or allowing this kind of behavior.
02:20So I think the president that's going to get set here is that acknowledging and enforcement to the law needs to be respected, and that protest is also – civil disobedience will be acknowledged and respected.
02:33But cross the line into protest and rioting, that has to be much more strongly pushed back and put in place.
02:40And we're starting to see in the Democrat Party that there is a division that's starting to sow here where more and more Democrats are coming onto the side of law and order and not supporting these rioters.
