Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told U.S. troops that the Pentagon will make a “calm, orderly, and professional transition” to the incoming Trump administration, according to a Wednesday memo.
“Our fellow citizens have elected the next President of the United States,” Austin wrote. “As it always has, the U.S. military will stand ready to carry out the policy choices of its next Commander in Chief, and to obey all lawful orders from its civilian chain of command.”
He also wrote that U.S. service members will “continue to stand apart from the political arena,” continue to support and defend the Constitution, and stand with ally and partner countries.
“You are not just any military,” Austin writes. “You are the United States military — the finest fighting force on Earth — and you will continue to defend our country, our Constitution, and the rights of all of our citizens.”
Austin’s memo comes in the wake of an unprecedented victory by President-elect Trump, who last month suggested he would be open to using the U.S. military for domestic law enforcement against the “radical left” as well as for mass deportations.
“I think the bigger problem are the people from within. We have some very bad people. We have some sick people, radical-left lunatics,” Trump said in an in an interview with Fox News. “And it should be very easily handled by, if necessary, by [the] National Guard or, if really necessary, by the military, because they can’t let that happen.”
His election also has raised questions inside the Pentagon about what would happen if he unlawfully calls on active-duty troops to deploy domestically or invokes the Insurrection Act.
While the 1878 Posse Comitatus Act largely prohibits active-duty troops from carrying out law enforcement duties inside the United States, the Insurrection Act of 1807 can be used by the president to call on American troops if there’s been “any insurrection, domestic violence, unlawful combination or conspiracy” in a state that “opposes or obstructs the execution of the laws of the United States or impedes the course of justice under those laws.”
Austin also appeared to take a swipe at Trump last month, when he criticized “some who say that both sides are to blame” in the war that began when Russian President Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine in 2022.
He did not name Trump or far-right Republicans who have opposed sending more aid to Ukraine and have been critical of defending the country.
“There are some who don’t understand — or say they don’t understand — what is at stake between the free world and an aggressive tyrant like Putin. And I say: Let them come to Kyiv,” Austin said at the Kyiv Diplomatic Academy after making a surprise visit to Ukraine.
