active duty

His last Defense secretary, Mark Esper, and his appointee as chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Gen. Mark A. Milley, resisted his proposal in 2020 to invoke the Insurrection Act and deploy active duty troops against demonstrators in Washington and other cities.

In a retirement speech in September 2023, Milley — who worries about being recalled to active duty and court-martialed under a new Trump administration, according to Woodward’s latest book, “War” — offered an indirect commentary widely presumed to refer to the former president: “We don’t take an oath to a king or a queen, to a tyrant or dictator, or wannabe dictator.”

Identity, his experience of the justice system as well as his time in the Army on active duty in Germany and Northern Ireland, are often themes that feature in his paintings.

When Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies searched a former Drug Enforcement Administration agent’s home last month, court records show they found DEA credentials modified to make it appear that he was still on active duty, along with 30,000 rounds of ammunition, several grenades and a cache of 15 different firearms — including a sawed-off shotgun and four others illegal to own under California law.

The recent ruling could open the door to her return to active duty in another unit, such as the LAPD’s training division.