Jack Goldsmith and Bob Bauer on Reforming the Insurrection Act
The Lawfare Podcast
The Lawfare Institute
4.7 • 6.4K Ratings
🗓️ 12 April 2024
⏱️ 58 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Insurrection Act is a provision that allows the president to deploy the U.S. military for domestic law enforcement. It’s been invoked dozens of times by presidents to respond to crises in the over 230 years that it’s been around, but it hasn’t been reformed in centuries. In recent years, the Insurrection Act has come back into public focus because of its implication in a number of domestic crises, prompting a renewed conversation about whether it’s finally time to curb the sweeping powers afforded to the executive in this unique federal law.
On April 8, the American Law Institute released a set of principles for Insurrection Act reform, prepared by a group of 10 individuals with backgrounds in constitutional law, national security law, and military law. The co-chairs of this group were Jack Goldsmith, Lawfare Co-Founder and Harvard Law School Professor, and Bob Bauer, Professor of Practice and Distinguished Scholar in Residence at New York University School of Law. They joined Lawfare Associate Editor Hyemin Han to talk about the history of the Insurrection Act, to parse out the recommendations the American Law Institute is making for reform, and to make the case for reforming the act in 2024.
To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare. You can also support Lawfare by making a one-time donation at https://givebutter.com/c/trumptrials.
Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | The following podcast contains advertising. |
| 0:04.0 | To access an ad-free version of the Lawfair Podcast, |
| 0:08.0 | become a material supporter of Lawfair at Patreon.com slash Lawfair. That's Patreon.com |
| 0:16.4 | slash Lawfair. Also check out Lawfair's other podcast offerings, rational security, chatter, lawfare no bull, and the aftermath. |
| 0:30.0 | Speaking of the insurrection acts as an authorization for extreme cases, you would want that concept of |
| 0:40.0 | regular law enforcement being overwhelmed to govern the president's use of the term domestic |
| 0:46.2 | violence as a source of authority under the statute. |
| 0:49.2 | Right now it is a term that appears in the statute untethered to any definition. And so a protest that gets out of |
| 0:56.8 | control for three hours could arguably for a president so disposed, enable him or her just on the face of the statute to invoke the act and to |
| 1:06.3 | deploy troops. |
| 1:07.3 | I'm Haman Hahn, associate editor at Law Fair. |
| 1:11.3 | This is the Law Fair podcast for April 12, 2024. The Insurection Act is a provision in the Constitution |
| 1:18.0 | that allows the President to deploy the U.S. military for domestic law enforcement. It's been invoked dozens of times by |
| 1:24.0 | presidents to respond to crises in the over 230 years that it's been around, but it hasn't |
| 1:28.6 | been reformed in centuries. In recent years, the Insirection Act has come back into public focus because of its implication in a number of domestic crises, |
| 1:37.0 | prompting a renewed conversation about whether it's finally time to curve the sleeping powers afforded to the executive in this unique federal law. |
| 1:46.0 | On April 8th, the American Law Institute released a set of principles for Insurrection Act reform, prepared |
| 1:51.7 | by a group of 10 individuals with backgrounds in |
| 1:54.0 | constitutional law, national security law, and military law. The co-chairs of this |
| 1:59.3 | group were Jack Goldsmith, lawfare co-founder and Harvard Law School Professor, and Bob Bauer, Professor |
| 2:05.6 | of Practice and Distinguished Scholar in Residence at New York University School of Law. |
| 2:10.3 | They joined me to talk about the history of the Insirection Act, to parse out the recommendations |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Lawfare Institute, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Lawfare Institute and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.