Trump 'looking at all options' amid threats to invoke Insurrection Act, Vance says [View all]

Source: The Guardian

Sun 12 Oct 2025 14.07 EDT
Last modified on Sun 12 Oct 2025 21.30 EDT


The White House is talking about invoking the Insurrection Act that would allow the deployment of military troops on US soil to quell domestic unrest amid legal challenges over the moves, JD Vance confirmed on Sunday. Vance was asked on NBC News’s Meet the Press whether Donald Trump was seriously considering invoking the emergency power to deploy national guard forces and even the US military in domestic settings.

“The president’s looking at all of his options,” he said, adding that “we are talking about this because crime has gotten out of control in our cities”. Trump’s attempts to use federal national guard forces in Democratic-run cities has faced challenges in the courts, most notably in Chicago in recent days.

The vice-president’s ominous remarks came days after Trump referred to the Insurrection Act from the Oval Office, bluntly stating: “If I had to enact it, I would do that.” Military forces are forbidden from engaging in law enforcement duties on home soil. But under the Insurrection Act, which was signed in 1807, the president can deploy them domestically in cases of insurrection or rebellion, violence that is preventing the functioning of federal laws.

The power was used during the 1960s civil rights movement during clashes over desegregation of the south but since then has been very rarely activated. The last time a president called on it was in 1992 when the governor of California requested military aid from George HW Bush in response to civil unrest in Los Angeles.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/oct/12/trump-vance-insurrection-act-military