State senators press White House, Pentagon chiefs on the use of military on protesters

Washington — Sens. Richard Blumenthal and Chris Murphy on Wednesday joined a group of fellow Democratic senators in pressing Pentagon chiefs about the use military force on protesters who have marched and demonstrated in dozens of American cities.

Blumenthal and Murphy wrote Department of Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley a letter signed by 21 Senate Democrats that asked the military leaders whether the Pentagon would deploy federal troops under the Insurrection Act. The act is a 1807 federal law that empowers the president to deploy military troops within the United States in particular and extreme circumstances, such as to suppress civil disorder, insurrection and rebellion.

The letter also cited the Posse Comitatus Act, which generally prohibits the U.S. armed forces from performing law enforcement duties in the United States.

“President Trump’s behavior over the last three years has repeatedly politicized our Armed Forces and portrayed their mission not as one to protect and defend the Constitution, but rather to protect and defend his political interests,” the senators wrote. “The military should never be weaponized by the President to limit these expressions for liberty and justice. We believe it is antithetical to what those in uniform have sworn to protect and defend, and a serious threat to our democratic system.”

President Donald Trump this week threatened to use the Insurrection Act to quell what he considers lawlessness by people who have demonstrated to protest the death of a black Minneapolis man, George Floyd, who was fatally choked under the knee of a white police officer.

Some attending the protests have rioted and looted, but they have largely been peaceful, even as curfews imposed on several cities this week, including Washington, D.C., New York and Los Angeles, have been ignored by protesters.

Earlier this week Esper asked governors, including Ned Lamont, to send their guardsmen to Washington, D.C.

Capt. David Pytlik, spokesman for Connecticut’s National Guard, said the state was asked to provide aircraft and crew to ferry guardsmen from other states to Washington, D.C. But he said Esper did not give the Connecticut National Guard enough time to be able to respond. “It was a very short time frame,” he said.

So the Connecticut Air Guardsmen, who fly C-130 military transport aircraft out of a base at Bradley International Airport, are “on standby,” Pytlik said.