Why did Trump not invoke the Insurrection Act?

FPI / June 30, 2021

As Black Lives Matter and Antifa looted and burned cities across America last summer, Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, reportedly went out of his way to prevent President Donald Trump from invoking the Insurrection Act to contain the violence.

As the riots raged, Democrats, RINOs, and the corporate media counseled that any such an action by Trump was disproportionate to the "mostly peaceful protests". The president was depicted as a conspiracy theorist.

Trump was also urged by non-Swamp dwelling supporters to invoke the Insurrection Act following multiple reports of election irregularities in key battleground states on Nov. 3, 2020. Then when he spoke to supporters at a rally in Washington on Jan. 6, he was castigated for inciting an "insurrection".

Milley took the side of "protesters" and allied with former Attorney General Bill Barr and Defense Secretary Mark Esper "to browbeat Trump out of invoking the Insurrection Act," National File reported on Jan. 18.

According to a Jan. 18 report by Axios, Trump was so furious with Milley, Esper, and Barr as violence wrecked lives and businesses nationwide that he slammed his hand against the "Resolute Desk" and exclaimed, “No one supports me! No one gives me any f**king support!”

The reports foreshadow what is happening in the early summer of 2021 as Milley has become "something of a national laughingstock" since his comments about "white rage" during a congressional hearing last week, National File's Gabriel Keane noted.

Related: The 2020 information war has not ended; Why Trump backers still panic the Left, February 2, 2021

An upcoming book by Wall Street Journal reporter Michael C. Bender alleges that, in response to Trump’s wish to invoke the Insurrection Act, Milley pointed at a portrait of Abraham Lincoln hanging on the wall and claimed, “That guy had an insurrection. What we have, Mr. President, is a protest.”

The book also says that when senior Trump adviser Stephen Miller stated that “These cities are burning,” Milley jabbed a finger in his direction and snapped, “Shut the f**k up, Stephen.”

While claiming the riots that ruined cities and lives last summer were merely a "protest," Milley has been fully on board with rooting out the so-called "enemy within" following the events of Jan. 6, 2021.

The entire federal government has in effect invoked the Insurrection Act since that day to lock down the nation's capital and target Trump and his supporters, critics say.

Milley was pilloried by Fox News host Tucker Carlson on Thursday for a series of bizarre comments Milley made in defense of teaching critical race theory in the military.

“He’s not just a pig, he’s stupid,” Carlson said of Milley, adding, “Milley got the job because he is obsequious, he knows who to suck up to and he’s more than happy to do it. Feed him a script, and he will read it.”

Free Press International