Federal law limits Trump's proposal to send troops to guard border
President Donald Trump on Tuesday said he hopes to send members of the military to guard the southwest border — an escalation in his push to reduce the number of immigrants coming to the U.S. But without sign off from Congress or Gov. Jerry Brown, federal law will likely block the president’s plans, at least in California.
Since he took office, Trump has criticized U.S. laws that allow people to come to the border and ask for asylum. After reports of a large caravan of migrants traveling through Mexico to seek asylum from violence-stricken Central American countries surfaced over Easter, the president reinforced his push to change what he called “weak” immigration laws.
Trump said he planned to meet with Gen. Jim Mattis, the defense secretary, on Tuesday to discuss options for installing troops at the U.S.-Mexico border.
“The Mexican border is very unprotected by our laws,” Trump said during a news conference with the presidents of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. “We have horrible, horrible, and very unsafe, laws in the United States.”
The White House confirmed that Trump’s strategy involves mobilizing the National Guard.
Trump said the military would remain at the border until his promised border wall is completed. Though Congress has granted $1.6 billion in funding for new and replacement fencing along the border, Trump has not been able to get funding to build a wall fashioned after his prototypes in Otay Mesa.
Everard Meade, director of the Trans Border Institute at University of San Diego, said the president will also have a difficult time installing troops at the border.
“They’ve been using military metaphors and talking about invasions — in that sense, it’s not a surprise, but when you move from political rhetoric to actual policy, I don’t see a legal way to actually do it,” Meade said. “The U.S. Armed Forces are far too professional and risk-averse and rule-bound to accept some vague cowboy mission down there. That’s just not what they do.”
The Posse Comitatus Act, which passed after the Civil War to keep federal troops from policing the South, limits federal troops’ deployment on U.S. soil and forbids using them to enforce domestic laws.
The President can
deploy troops if there’s an insurrection or invasion on U.S. soil. Congress later gave the military the ability to provide equipment and personnel for certain drug enforcement operations. The Coast Guard is exempt from the act’s restrictions.
The estimated 1,200 migrants in the caravan would not count as an invasion, Meade said. Border Patrol
has also apprehended significantly fewer unauthorized crossers since arrests peaked in 2000, according to data from the agency, which Meade said would also argue against sending military.
Governors can deploy the National Guard in their states to respond to emergencies. Previous presidents have, with governor sign off, used the National Guard to supplement Border Patrol agents during hiring pushes.
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