Aides to former President Donald Trump last year drafted an order that would allow Trump to invoke the Insurrection Act amidst the ongoing demonstrations and civil unrest after George Floyd's death.
The New York Times reported on Friday that two senior Trump administration officials and a group of White House staff prepared a document on June 1, 2020, that would give Trump the authority to deploy thousands of active-duty troops throughout Washington, D.C., to respond to the protests.
However, Trump told the Times he did not wish to deploy troops on U.S. citizens.
“It’s absolutely not true and if it was true, I would have done it,” Trump said.
The sources told the Times that some Trump aides went ahead and prepared a draft order in case Trump decided to invoke the Insurrection Act of 1807, which allows the president to deploy U.S. military personnel and National Guard troops to quell waves of civil disorder or insurrection throughout the country.
The Act has only been invoked twice in the last 40 years: once to respond to unrest following Hurricane Hugo in 1989, and another time during the Los Angeles riots in 1992.
One senior official told the Times that Trump was aware of the document, which had been prepared the same day law enforcement agencies forcibly removed protesters from Lafayette Square.
The officials also added that Trump had continued to propose deploying military troops after the June 1 demonstrations in cities such as Portland, Ore., where massive anti-police protests took place.
A federal judge earlier this week ruled that then-Attorney General William Barr and current and former officials named in the clearing of Lafayette Square are entitled to qualified immunity for their actions during the June 1, 2020 protests.
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