Report: Michigan Dem Rep. Haley Stevens’ Bill Aims to Bar President Trump from Deploying Military in U.S.
A Democrat lawmaker reportedly wants to bar President Donald Trump from deploying troops to a state or territory without the governor’s request.
The news follows leftist anti-ICE riots in Los Angeles that lasted for several days, prompting Trump to take action.
Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI) is reportedly going to introduce legislation that would make it unlawful for Trump to take such action, the Hillreported on Monday, noting the legislation is called the Stop Trump’s Abuse of Power Act.
In the early part of June, the president deployed hundreds of U.S. Marines and more than 2,000 California National Guard troops to Democrat-controlled Los Angeles after violence erupted as ICE agents were enforcing immigration law in the area.
The leftist rioters also targeted law enforcement officers in the streets:
In her statement, Stevens claimed Trump had disregard for the Constitution and due process and also blamed him for “escalating tension and violence” in Los Angeles after “unlawfully” deploying members of the military to the area.
She then called on officials to take action against the president.
Stevens said:
We must stand up to Donald Trump’s chaos and destruction, which is why I am introducing this legislation to limit his powers and make sure he cannot deploy troops on U.S. soil for his political gain. We are a nation of laws and it’s about time the President begins to follow them.
The Hill article noted that “According to Stevens’s office, the legislation would add the language into the Insurrection Act of 1807 and only apply to duties connected to peaceful demonstrations.”
During the anti-ICE rioting, Los Angeles Police Department Chief Jim McDonnell said the situation was “getting increasingly worse and more violent” since the protests began, adding that people were throwing “commercial grade fireworks” at officers, per Breitbart News. “We are overwhelmed as far as the number of people out there engaged in this type of activity, and the type of things that they are doing,” he added.
Trump criticized Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass (D) for how they handled the riots and the wildfires that devastated so many people earlier in the year.
In a post on Truth Social, he wrote, “If I didn’t ‘SEND IN THE TROOPS’ to Los Angeles the last three nights, that once beautiful and great City would be burning to the ground right now, much like 25,000 houses burned to the ground in L.A. due to an incompetent Governor and Mayor.”
Days later, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled unanimously that Trump can federalize the California National Guard after Newsom claimed his move was “illegal,” Breitbart News reported.
