WASHINGTON — Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., defended the Trump administration’s Sept. 2 strike that killed the survivors of an initial strike on an alleged drug boat, telling NBC News’ “Meet the Press” that the survivors “were not incapacitated.”
The senator also argued that President Donald Trump did not have to seek congressional approval if he continued boat strikes past the window designated by the War Powers Resolution, which puts checks on the president’s ability to use the armed forces without congressional approval.
Cotton, who serves as the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, was briefed by Adm. Frank M. Bradley last week on the September strikes. Bradley briefed the leaders of the House and Senate intelligence committees and the leaders of the House and Senate armed services committees.
Asked whether there was evidence indicating that the alleged drug boat was headed to the U.S. before the military struck it twice, killing survivors, Cotton said, “That didn’t come up in my briefing.”
“But again, there’s very reliable multiple sources of intelligence that tells us that this boat had drugs on it, that everyone on that boat was associated with these designated foreign terrorist organizations that are trying to kill American children,” Cotton said.
Asked whether he was comfortable with the U.S. targeting a boat when he has not seen evidence that it is heading to the U.S. or an imminent threat, Cotton said he wanted the strikes to continue.
“Any boat loaded with drugs that is crewed by associates and members of foreign terrorist organizations that are trying to kill American kids, I think, is a valid target,” he said. “I’m not just comfortable with it, I want to continue it.”
Cotton also said he did not “have any problem” with releasing video of the strikes, though he noted that the Defense Department “may have valid concerns about revealing” alleged cartel tactics or U.S. sources or methods. The department has repeatedly released videos of other strikes on alleged drug boats.
NBC News reported that U.S. intelligence showed that the boat was traveling toward the South American nation of Suriname, which was first reported by CNN, and that the drugs were ultimately heading to Europe or Africa.
Cotton said that the survivors of the initial strike, who were killed in the second strike, were not “incapacitated.”
“They were not in the water, surviving only because they had a life jacket or hanging to a plank of wood,” Cotton said. “They were sitting on that boat. They were clearly moving around on it.”
Cotton alleged that the survivors appeared at one point to try to flip over the capsized boat, “presumably to rescue its cargo and continue their mission,” he added.
NBC News has not independently verified details of the strike.
Asked whether they could have been trying to flip over the boat to stay afloat, Cotton said, “Maybe they were signaling to other airplanes or drug cartel boats, because they’re in waters that are just off drug cartel areas.”
“At one point, the guy takes off his T-shirt, maybe he’s trying to get a sun tan,” Cotton added. “It doesn’t really matter what they were trying to do. What matters is that they were not in a shipwreck state, distressed, dog-paddling in the water.”
NBC News reported Saturday that Bradley told lawmakers that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the military to kill all 11 people on the alleged drug boat during the Sept. 2 strikes because they were on an internal list of legitimate military targets, according to officials familiar with the briefings. Hegseth said Saturday that he would have made the same call to strike the alleged drug boat a second time.
NBC News reported last week that Bradley saw the survivors of the first Sept. 2 strike as legitimate military targets based on the rules of operation. An administration official previously told NBC News that Bradley had made clear in his briefings to Congress that he had acted in compliance with laws during the operation and that a uniformed JAG provided counsel throughout.
The strike prompted controversy on Capitol Hill and beyond, and lawmakers launched inquiries into the strike as critics argued it could have potentially been a war crime.
Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., said in a separate interview on “Meet the Press” that the strikes on the alleged boats were “unlawful” and “a form of extrajudicial killing.”
He urged the administration to release the video of the Sept. 2 strikes, saying, “If the Pentagon and our defense secretary is so proud of what they’re doing, let the American people see that video.”
“Let the American people see two people standing on a capsized boat or sitting on a capsized boat and deliberately killed, and decide for themselves whether they’re proud of what the country is doing,” Schiff said.
“I can’t imagine people will be proud of that,” the California senator said, arguing that the U.S. should instead prosecute people who bring drugs into the country. “We shouldn’t be simply killing people at sea who are not even coming to this country.”
The military has said it has conducted nearly two dozen strikes on alleged drug boats in recent months, killing at least 86 people. The Trump administration has not provided evidence regarding its claims about the boats or the individuals killed during the operations.
Asked whether he believed Trump needed to seek congressional approval to continue the strikes, Cotton said “no.”
The War Powers Resolution of 1973 says that a president must end the use of military force after 60 days if the president did not notify Congress beforehand.
“There’s literally hundreds, if not thousands of examples of presidents using the military to protect America going back to the earliest days of our republic,” Cotton said.
