Prez’s threat to invoke Insurrection Act escalates showdown with Dems

WASHINGTON: Donald Trump's threat to invoke a federal anti-insurrection law to expand his deployment of military personnel to US cities has intensified the legal battle between the president and Democratic-led cities, as hundreds of National Guard troops from Texas on Tuesday prepared to patrol the streets of Chicago.

- 

Trump told reporters on Monday that he would consider utilising the Insurrection Act, a law enacted more than two centuries ago, to sidestep any court rulings restricting his orders to send Guard troops into cities over the objections of local and state officials. "We have an Insurrection Act for a reason," Trump said. "If people were being killed and courts were holding us up, or governors or mayors were holding us up, sure, I'd do that."