National Guard troops are arriving in Washington, D.C., Tuesday after President Donald Trump deployed some-800 to patrol city streets in the nation’s capitol and placed the city’s police department in direct federal control.
The deployment is meant to address what the president sees as out-of-control crime in D.C. He warned that other cities could face similar intervention.
“We’re not gonna lose our cities over this,” President Trump told reporters at a Monday press briefing, also mentioning Chicago, New York and Baltimore. “And this will go further.”
To get a sense of what this could mean for Minnesota, MPR News guest host Brandt Williams spoke with Peter Larsen, an assistant professor of law at Mitchell Hamline School of Law.
Press play above to hear their conversation or read a transcript below, edited for time and clarity.
How seriously are you reading the president’s threat to take control in other cities across the country?
I would absolutely take it seriously. We saw what happened in Los Angeles. We’re seeing what’s happening in D.C. right now.
From what I understand, this is a bit of a unique situation, because D.C. is not a state, and there is a law that lets the president take control of its police department. It sounds like that specific law could not be applied elsewhere. Is that right?
That’s correct. The District of Columbia has the Home Rule Act, which gives the president some broader control over the D.C. National Guard. Anything that happens in a place like Minneapolis, Chicago, Baltimore, you have to deal with some other legal obstacles.
Two of those are the Posse Comitatus Act, which generally prohibits the use of federal troops and civilians within the United States, and also Title 10 of the U.S. Code, section 12406, which sets out a specific procedure for how National Guard is supposed to be deployed within U.S. borders.
As we see these images of troops on the ground in D.C., it brings to mind the deployment of the National Guard in Minnesota in 2020. But those troops were deployed by the governor. You’re saying that the president would not have authority to send troops here without the governor’s approval?
I think that is correct. What we saw recently in L.A. seemed to be potentially, at least, in violation of Title 10 of the U.S. Code. Right now, there’s a trial going on in California as to whether the president’s deployment actually did violate that.
Just based on your understanding of federal law, what’s your sense of how strong a case the federal government may have?
My personal take on it is the federal government doesn’t have that strong of a leg to stand on.
Crime has been on the decline, but the president says it’s not. If you’re a local law enforcement agency or a local city attorney, do you think saying, ‘No, wait a minute, crime is actually going down here,’ would be a compelling argument?
Absolutely, you would want to take all sorts of things into account. What are the crime rates? What has been the relationship between law enforcement and the communities that it’s policing? What are the nature of the crimes? Local jurisdictions would mostly be relying on the fact that we don’t need additional help. If we needed additional help, we would follow the procedure and call on the governor or call on the president.
