WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth were back on Capitol Hill on Tuesday to brief lawmakers on the Trump administration’s ongoing strikes against what it says are drug smuggling vessels at sea.
The briefing came just hours after a new interview further suggested the campaign — presented as a war against drugs and cartels — is also aimed specifically at Venezuela and its leader, Nicolás Maduro, in particular.
Rubio and Hegseth emerged from the meeting with senators touting what the secretary of state called the administration’s “highly successful mission” to target the boats in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean that they say are coming from places that include Venezuela and carrying illegal drugs. Fresh strikes against three additional boats Monday night in the eastern Pacific brought the total number of vessels struck as part of the monthslong campaign to more than two dozen, killing more than 90 people.
But many Democratic lawmakers left the briefing far from satisfied — or with “more questions than answers,” as Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., put it.
The chamber’s Democratic leader, Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York, specifically fumed that Hegseth “refused” to show all senators the full, unedited video of a highly controversial follow-up strike on a vessel on Sept. 2 that started the ongoing campaign. Reporting earlier this month that a second strike was carried out on the boat to kill two people who survived the first hit caused a firestorm in Washington, leading some Democrats to raise concerns about the potential that a war crime had occurred.
“If they can’t be transparent on this, how can you trust their transparency on all the other issues swirling about in the Caribbean?” Schumer told reporters after the meeting. “Every senator is entitled to see it.”
The defense chief told reporters that select members of the House and Senate on “appropriate” committees have seen the video or will soon see it, but made clear that, for now, he does not intend to release it more broadly. That’s even as members of Congress are seeking to require, through he defense policy bill known as the National Defense Authorization Act, that footage of the strikes be released. The House passed the legislation last week, and the Senate will vote on it soon.
“In keeping with longstanding Department of War policy — Department of Defense policy — of course we’re not going to release a top secret, full unedited video of that to the general public,” Hegseth said after the briefing.
Meanwhile, some Republicans, including Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, exited the briefing expressing profuse confidence in the administration’s moves.
“There’s no doubt in my mind that we have the legal authority to blow up these boats, interdict these boats,” Graham told reporters.
After Rubio and Hegseth traveled to the other side of the Hill to give House members a briefing, Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., was similarly assertive in his belief that the administration, and President Donald Trump in particular, has the authority to be taking such actions, pointing to their determination that the U.S. is in a “non-international armed conflict” with drug cartels. He said the administration has “exquisite intelligence” to support its actions and noted the deaths that have occurred from drug overdoses in the U.S.
“This is a serious problem that a serious administration is addressing,” Johnson said.
Questions from some lawmakers have persisted over the legal rationale for the moves, the evidence and intelligence the administration has on the boats it is striking, and whether Congress should be involved in authorizing such actions — particularly has Trump floats strikes on land as the next step in his self-declared war on cartels. There have been multiple attempts in the Senate to pass war powers resolutions to require Congress’ involvement in the campaign, with more — including potentially also in the House — set to be pushed this week.
Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, one of the few Republicans in the upper chamber to publicly voice concerns about the campaign, told reporters after the briefing that “so far, no one’s presented any evidence that any of these people are armed.”
And lawmakers of both parties have noted the administration’s ultimate goal as it pertains to Venezuela is not entirely clear.
The administration has built up a presence in the area and last week announced the seizure of an oil tanker off the country’s coast. Rubio and Hegseth’s presence on the Hill on Tuesday came after White House chief of staff Susie Wiles appeared to shed more light on the situation. In an interview with Vanity Fair released Tuesday, Wiles said Trump “wants to keep on blowing boats up until Maduro cries uncle.”
“And people way smarter than me say that he will,” she added of the Venezuelan leader.