Trump vows military land campaign against alleged drug traffickers

President Donald Trump said on Saturday that he intends to expand his military campaign against alleged drug traffickers from operations at sea to land, building on recent boat strikes in the Pacific and Caribbean that have drawn sharp criticism from lawmakers and legal experts.

Citing a decrease in illegal narcotics entering the U.S. by sea, Trump said the U.S. is “going to start that same process on land.” “We know every route, we know every house, we know where they live,” the president continued. “We know everything about them. They kill 300,000 people this year, and that’s like a war.”

The remarks, made at a celebration for recipients of the annual Kennedy Center Honors, come as the administration has faced mounting criticism over the missile strikes on boats off Venezuela’s coast that are suspected of carrying drugs. 

Some lawmakers and legal scholars have suggested that those strikes may violate both American and international law. That debate has intensified over the last week amid a raging controversy about a Sept. 2 double-tap strike that targeted two survivors of an early missile attack. 

On Wednesday, Trump was pressed about releasing the video of that strike. He said he doesn’t know what footage exists, but “whatever they have, we’ll certainly release.” Asked on Saturday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth declined to commit to releasing the footage, but said “we are reviewing it.”

A number of lawmakers have alleged that the second strike may violate the U.S.’s own Law of War Manual, which prohibits the killing of shipwrecked enemy combatants.

“Going after survivors in the water, that is clearly not lawful,” said Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz. Kelly, who is a former Navy pilot, was among six Democratic members of Congress who spoke in a video in November reminding members of the defense and intelligence communities that they can and and must “refuse illegal orders.”

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, whom the Trump administration designated as the head of a foreign terrorist organization, has alleged that the U.S. is “fabricating” a war. He called the American military presence in the Caribbean “the greatest threat that has been seen on our continent in the last 100 years.”