WASHINGTON — Trump administration officials briefed lawmakers this week on a new legal opinion justifying the operation to capture Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, who are facing narcotics charges in federal court in New York.
The opinion comes from the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, according to lawmakers who spoke to NBC News. The lawmakers hadn’t seen details yet, but said it sought to give legal justification for the raid and capture. The Wall Street Journal first reported on the new opinion.
The office serves as a sort of in-house counsel for the federal government, providing legal justifications and opinions for the federal government. During the George W. Bush’s administration, it produced memos that provided the legal framework for the use of “enhanced interrogation techniques,” including waterboarding.
During Barack Obama’s presidency, the office determined the administration had been legally justified in targeting Anwar al-Awlaki, an American citizen and radical cleric who was killed in a 2011 drone strike.
More recently, the office has justified the boat strikes that have killed dozens of individuals the administration has said were engaged in drug trafficking.
The Justice Department didn’t immediately comment on the opinion.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche previously declined to say whether the office had weighed in on the Maduro operation, telling NBC News he was not “going to get into any discussions” that occurred but saying there was “no doubt what we did was legal.”
Blanche said the U.S. “has an absolute legal right to go and arrest people charged with horrible crimes,” and that “what we did was not only right and not only legal, but it’s what the American people expect us to do when we file charges against individuals like him.”
A lawmaker who was briefed on the matter told NBC News that Secretary of State Marco Rubio mentioned the Office of Legal Counsel’s opinion at a briefing and said it would be made available to lawmakers, but did not specify timing.
The Trump administration has suggested Maduro’s capture was a law enforcement operation, though it involved a military operation into a sovereign country. Legal experts say that such an operations violate international law, with United Nations experts stating the actions “represent a grave, manifest and deliberate violation of the most fundamental principles of international law, set a dangerous precedent, and risk destabilizing the entire region and the world.”
Democratic members of Congress have argued Trump acted outside of his scope. On Thursday, the Senate voted to advance a bipartisan resolution to block the president from using military force “within or against Venezuela” unless he gets prior approval from Congress.
“If this was a law enforcement operation, it doesn’t require congressional approval,” said Trump ally Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., who said he wanted to see the memo to “try to get a handle on what exactly they’re going to do next.”
Maduro and his wife pleaded not guilty to drug conspiracy charges after they were brought to federal court in New York this week.
