Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Senate Intelligence Committee chairman Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) said all the people on a Venezuelan drug boat subject to the Trump administration crackdown in the Caribbean were “valid targets.”
Host Kristen Welker said, “I want to ask you about our new reporting. NBC News is reporting this morning that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, his order was to kill all 11 individuals on that boat because they were on a list of narco terrorists who intelligence and military officials determined could be legally targeted. Was Secretary Hegseth’s order to kill everyone on the boat because they were on this target list, Senator?”
Cotton said, “The order, like the entire operation, Kristen, is to destroy these drug boats which are running drugs into our country from foreign drug cartels and traffickers that are killing hundreds of Arkansans every year and killing hundreds of thousands of Americans. Of course, before our military conducts such a strike, they have multiple sources of intelligence. They give high confidence that everyone on that boat is a foreign drug trafficker, not an innocent civilian who is being human trafficked, for instance. Secretary Hegseth and I agree they’re all valid targets.”
He added, “This controversy all started with The Washington Post story nine days ago that said after the first strike, there were two survivors that were helpless, and then they were ordered to kill the helpless survivors. That is simply not the case. They were not floating in the ocean on a wooden plank or in life jackets; they were not on a capsized vessel. They were not incapacitated in any way. It was entirely appropriate to strike the boat again to make sure the cargo was destroyed, and it is in no way a violation of the law of war. I think The Washington Post owes Secretary Hegseth and especially Admiral Bradley an apology for that slander.”
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