Social media users criticized Vice President JD Vance after he joked about the military strikes on alleged drug boats from Venezuela.

President Donald Trump announced earlier this week that the U.S. carried out a deadly military strike on a boat from Venezuela that was allegedly carrying drugs, marking the second time this month the U.S. has targeted a boat in the Caribbean. Vance laughed about the strikes during a speech on Wednesday, saying he would not want to go “fishing” in those waters.

“I was talking to Secretary Hegseth, and you know what he said? ‘You know what, Mr. Vice President, we don’t see any of these drug boats coming into our country. They’ve completely stopped.’ And I said, ‘I know why. I would stop too,’” Vance said as the audience laughed.

“Hell, I wouldn’t go fishing right now in that area of the world,” Vance added.

He continued to boast about the strikes, saying that the government is “fighting for the interests of Americans and nobody else.”

“And we can stop this terrible poison from coming into our country. We just needed a president who was willing to fight for you, and now we’ve got one,” Vance added.

Vance’s comments were met with criticism from social media users, who questioned why the vice president was making jokes about deadly military strikes. There have been concerns on both sides of the aisle about the legality of the strikes and questions about how the Trump administration identified the alleged drug boats.

“Nothing like a joke about US potentially murdering innocent people. Ha ha,” Trump critic Ron Filipkowski wrote on X.

Political commentator Aaron Reichlin-Melnick said: “Get it? The joke is that we might kill some totally innocent people! Haha that’s funny, right?”

One user mocked Vance’s comments by writing, “‘lol – we’re murderers.’”

Another user jabbed Vance’s comments on X, writing: “Hee Hee … we might accidentally murder you if you are in a fishing boat 1500 miles away from our shores … hee hee …”

His comments come after Trump announced Monday that the U.S. carried out a second strike in recent weeks targeting a boat from Venezuela that was allegedly carrying drugs.

“The Strike occurred while these confirmed narcoterrorists from Venezuela were in International Waters transporting illegal narcotics (A DEADLY WEAPON POISONING AMERICANS!) headed to the U.S.,” Trump said in a Truth Social post announcing the strike. “These extremely violent drug trafficking cartels POSE A THREAT to U.S. National Security, Foreign Policy, and vital U.S. Interests.”

The strike was carried out nearly two weeks after another military strike on what the Trump administration said was a drug-carrying speedboat from Venezuela that killed 11.

Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office later on Monday, Trump said he had been shown footage of the latest strike by Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Asked what proof the U.S. has that the vessel was carrying drugs, Trump replied, “We have proof. All you have to do is look at the cargo that was spattered all over the ocean — big bags of cocaine and fentanyl all over the place.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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