Aides to Donald Trump drafted an order allowing him to invoke the Insurrection Act, which would empower him to use troops against George Floyd protesters last year, according to the New York Times.
Trump had reportedly discussed the idea to deploy thousands of active-duty troops throughout Washington, D.C., to respond to the protests in a meeting last year, sources told The New York Times.
Trump discussed invoking the Insurrection Act with then-Attorney General Bill Barr, Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley, who all talked him out of the plan, according The Times.
But, sources say aides to the former president drew up the proclamation on June 1, 2020, as the administration struggled to deal with the fall-out from the killing of George Floyd.
Later that day, law enforcement agencies forcibly removed protesters from Lafayette Square using tear-gas and smoke bombs, shortly before Trump crossed the area for a photo-op with a Bible at a nearby church.
Trump reportedly was aware of the document and continued to propose deploying military troops to cities across the country where protests against police brutality were taking place in the weeks after the June 1 demonstrations, sources told the Times.
However, Trump is denying the report that he planned to use the military on American citizens.
“It’s absolutely not true and if it was true, I would have done it,” Trump told the Times in a statement.
The Insurrection Act of 1807 empowers the President of the United States to deploy U.S. military and federalized National Guard troops within the United States in particular circumstances, such as to suppress civil disorder, insurrection, or rebellion.
The act has only been invoked twice in the past 40 years to respond to unrest following Hurricane Hugo in 1989, and in response to the 1992 Los Angeles riots.
