Tue Oct 07 14:00:44 UTC 2025: **Trump Threatens Insurrection Act Amid Protests and Legal Challenges to Immigration Crackdown**
**Washington D.C.** – President Donald Trump is threatening to invoke the Insurrection Act of 1807, a move that would allow him to deploy the military in U.S. cities, as he faces legal challenges and resistance to his anti-immigration policies.
The threat comes as Trump attempts to deploy National Guard troops to various cities, including Portland, Oregon, where a federal judge temporarily blocked the move, and Chicago, where Illinois Governor JB Pritzker has denounced a potential troop deployment as an “invasion.”
Trump alleges an “insurrection” is underway in Portland, citing protests near an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) building where clashes with federal officers have occurred. However, Oregon Governor Tina Kotek refuted the claim, stating, “There is no insurrection in Portland. No threat to national security.”
The Insurrection Act grants the president authority to use the military to quell insurrections, but legal experts argue this power is reserved for cases of major rebellion, akin to the Civil War. Constitutional lawyer Bruce Fein told Al Jazeera that no reasonable person believes a rebellion is underway in Portland, further clarifying it’s unclear if a president’s declaration of insurrection can be challenged in court.
Critics argue Trump’s use of the Act would be an abuse of power and a violation of the Posse Comitatus Act, which generally prohibits the military from engaging in domestic law enforcement. Trump has previously deployed the National Guard to California and Washington, D.C., using alternative legal justifications, which have faced legal challenges.
Illinois and Chicago officials have filed a lawsuit against the president’s deployment of National Guard troops to the city. This legal challenge calls the deployment an “unlawful and dangerous” escalation of Trump’s “War” on Chicago and Illinois. A court hearing is scheduled for Thursday.
The Insurrection Act has been invoked 30 times in U.S. history. The last time it was invoked was in 1992, by President George H.W. Bush, in response to the Rodney King riots in Los Angeles.
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