President Trump announced Friday that the US military had carried out another “lethal kinetic strike” on a boat accused of carrying drugs, the third in recent weeks.
The president announced the move on Truth Social, which included a video of a vessel strike. He claimed three “male narcoterrorists” were killed, but no Americans were injured. Mr. Trump did not specify where the boat was, but he did say it was in international waters in the United States’ Southern Command area of responsibility, which includes the Caribbean Sea and South America.
“Intelligence confirmed the vessel was trafficking illicit narcotics, and was transiting along a known narcotrafficking passage enroute to poison Americans,” they wrote. “STOP SELLING FENTANYL, NARCOTICS, AND ILLEGAL DRUGS IN AMERICA, AND COMMITTING VIOLENCE AND TERRORISM AGAINST AMERICANS!!!”
CBS News has reached out to the Pentagon for more information.
Mr. Trump’s strike on an alleged drug boat on Friday is the third he has publicly announced, following similar strikes on Monday and earlier this month. Mr. Trump claimed that the boats were from Venezuela in the first two strikes, but he did not specify a country of origin when announcing the attack on Friday.
Venezuela has not responded to the latest strike. CBS News has contacted Venezuelan officials for comment.
The strikes come as the Trump administration vows to combat drug trafficking in Central and South America. The federal government has designated several drug cartels and transnational gangs as terrorist organizations, and last month, President Trump directed the military to target cartels, according to CBS News.
Meanwhile, tensions between the United States and Venezuela have risen as the administration accuses Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro of involvement in drug trafficking, which his government has categorically denied.
The US Navy has dispatched several warships to the waters off Venezuela in recent weeks, and ten F-35 fighter jets were deployed to Puerto Rico this month for anti-cartel missions.
Maduro described the warships as a “absolutely criminal and bloody threat.” Venezuelan fighter jets approached a US naval ship twice earlier this month, in what multiple Defense Department officials described to CBS News as a “game of chicken.”
Venezuela also accused the United States of seizing a fishing vessel in its exclusive economic zone last weekend and holding nine fishermen for several hours.
CBS News previously reported that the first alleged drug boat struck earlier this month appeared to be turning around at the time.
Several Democratic lawmakers have criticized the strikes, claiming that the Trump administration has not provided a legal justification for using the military.
“President Trump’s actions are an outrageous violation of the law and a dangerous assault on our Constitution,” Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the Senate Armed Services Committee’s top Democrat, said this week. “No president can secretly wage war or carry out unjustified killings – that is authoritarianism, not democracy.”
After the first boat was struck in early September, the White House notified Congress, claiming that the strikes were within Mr. Trump’s legal authority.
“I directed these actions consistent with my responsibility to protect Americans and United States interests abroad and in furtherance of United States national security and foreign policy interests, pursuant to my constitutional authority as commander in chief and chief executive to conduct United States foreign relations,” according to the announcement.
