No, court-martial rules were not recently changed to include civilians | Fact check

Chris Mueller, USA TODAY
·4 min read

The claim: US recently changed court-martial rules to include civilians

A Nov. 26 Facebook video (direct link, archive link) shows Riccardo Bosi, a former Australian Army Special Forces lieutenant colonel who frequently talks about conspiracy theories, speaking in an office.

"EXECUTIVE ORDER 13825 (EO) Manual for Courts-Martial has been amended. It NOW includes CIVILIANS!!!" reads the video's caption. "This is the 'honey-pot' of all EO's."

"They can charge under this new courts-martial rule everybody that needs to be charged, which is brilliant," Bosi says in the video. "And it also includes civilians."

The video was shared more than 400 times in three weeks.

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While civilians can be court-martialed in some limited circumstances, there has been no recent change in the law that expands who can be charged in the military justice system, multiple experts told USA TODAY.

No recent law changes that allows civilians to be court-martialed

The Manual for Courts-Martial sets the procedural rules for a court-martial, but it's bound by the Uniform Code of Military Justice, a federal law enacted by Congress that "contains the substantive and procedural laws governing the military justice system," according to the Department of Defense.

Victor Hansen, a law professor at New England Law Boston, said the president does not have the authority to give an executive order that would expand the military justice system's jurisdiction to include civilians more broadly.

However, he said the president does have the authority to create or amend rules in the Manual for Courts-Martial as long as those changes align with federal law.

"Those rules obviously can't violate the statute," Hansen said, referring to the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

The 2007 defense bill, signed into law in October 2006, changed language in the Uniform Code of Military Justice to include civilians "serving with or accompanying an armed force in the field” not just in times of declared war, but also during "contingency operations."

"This category of civilians was designed to address contractor misconduct while in a deployed environment," said Mark Visger, a military law expert at the University of Dayton.

That was the last change to the statute that says when civilians can be court-martialed, Visger said.

"Ultimately, Congress specifies who is subject to court-martial, subject to constitutional limits set by the Supreme Court, and this law has not changed since 2007," he said.

The executive order referenced by the Facebook post, No. 13825, was signed by then-President Donald Trump in 2018. There was nothing in that order that expanded the military's jurisdiction over civilians, Hansen said.

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The Uniform Code of Military Justice has changed in other ways since 2007, though, including "sweeping changes" after Congress enacted the Military Justice Act of 2016, which, among other things, changed parts of the law related to sexual assault.

The Manual for Courts-Martial is typically changed a few times every year through the executive order process, Hansen said.

In July, for example, President Joe Biden signed an executive order that removed key decision-making authority from the military chain of command in cases of sexual assault, domestic violence, child abuse, murder and other serious crimes, officially implementing changes passed by Congress as part of fiscal year 2022’s National Defense Authorization Act, CNN reported.

USA TODAY reached out to the social media user who shared the post for comment but did not immediately receive a response.

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: No, court-martial rules not updated to include civilians | Fact check