President Donald Trump said Monday that U.S. military forces conducted a second strike on a Venezuelan boat carrying narcotics, killing three alleged "narcoterrorists" in international waters and escalating his administration's campaign to dismantle South American drug cartels.
"This morning, on my Orders, U.S. Military Forces conducted a SECOND Kinetic Strike against positively identified, extraordinarily violent drug trafficking cartels and narcoterrorists in the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility," Trump wrote on Truth Social. "The Strike resulted in 3 male terrorists killed in action. No U.S. Forces were harmed in this Strike. BE WARNED - IF YOU ARE TRANSPORTING DRUGS THAT CAN KILL AMERICANS, WE ARE HUNTING YOU!"
Trump also told reporters at the Oval Office that evidence confirmed the boat was loaded with cocaine and fentanyl. "All you have to do is look at the cargo," he said. "It was spattered all over the ocean. Big bags of cocaine and fentanyl all over the place." He added that U.S. forces knew "what time they were leaving, when they were leaving, what they had."
The latest strike follows a September 2 operation that targeted a suspected Tren de Aragua drug boat, leaving 11 people dead. Administration officials told Congress last week that the first strike was lawful under the president's Article 2 powers after Trump designated Tren de Aragua a foreign terrorist organization.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has spearheaded the administration's Venezuela strategy, said during a visit to Ecuador that "cooperative governments" would help the U.S. identify traffickers and "blow them up, if that's what it takes." In an interview with Fox News, Rubio argued that "interdiction alone is not going to stop these drug traffickers... Some of these boats need to be not just intercepted but stopped."
The Pentagon has significantly bolstered its presence in the Caribbean. Over the weekend, five F-35 fighter jets arrived in Puerto Rico to join roughly half a dozen Navy destroyers already stationed nearby. The Iwo Jima amphibious ready group - including the USS San Antonio, USS Iwo Jima and USS Fort Lauderdale with 4,500 sailors - and the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit with 2,200 Marines are also deployed, according to administration officials.
Trump has not ruled out further military action but has avoided committing to operations inside Venezuela. "What's illegal are the drugs that were on the boat," he told the Guardian when pressed on the legality of the strikes.
Reaction in Washington has been mixed. Senator Adam Schiff wrote on social media that he was "drafting a resolution and forcing a vote to reclaim Congress's power to declare war," calling the killings "lawless" and warning they could invite retaliation against U.S. forces.
In Caracas, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro condemned the U.S. operations and lashed out at Rubio, calling him "the Lord of Death and War and Hatred." Maduro said Venezuela would defend itself against foreign aggression and accused Washington of preparing for an invasion.
