This January 15, US President Donald Trump threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act, a rarely used 1807 law that would allow the president to deploy military forces domestically under certain conditions. According to Trump, this is a likely outcome if state and local officials fail to control widespread unrest linked to protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Minneapolis and elsewhere.
Trump argued that the Insurrection Act, which has been invoked in the past for major civil disturbances such as the 1992 Los Angeles riots, grants him authority to use federal military power when state leaders are unable or unwilling to maintain order or when federal laws are being obstructed. His comments followed intense protests in Minneapolis sparked by a series of violent incidents involving federal immigration agents, and continued legal disputes over the deployment of federal forces in US cities.
The archaic law was actually drawn up in 1792 when the United States was a very different country to the one Trump presides over today. The statute has been used by various White House incumbents on numerous occasions since, but critics argue that it is dangerously vague and in need of reform. So, what exactly is the Insurrection Act, and why and when has it been invoked?
Click through the following gallery and learn more about this centuries-old law and how it can be used.