Donald Trump believes he has a license to kill

What happens when a leader of a democratic country believes he has a license to kill and proceeds to use it? It appears we are finding out. 

During the arguments in Donald J. Trump v. United States, the Supreme Court case that conferred immunity from prosecution for presidents committing crimes in the course of their official duties, the prospect of a president ordering Seal Team Six to carry out assassinations of political opponents was raised to illustrate the breadth of powers being considered. This chilling scenario was raised in separate dissents by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson. But in his majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts dismissed such concerns as “fear mongering on the basis of extreme hypotheticals about a future where the President ‘feels empowered to violate federal criminal law.’”

As anyone could have predicted with Donald Trump’s return to office, it hasn’t taken long to test a different but nonetheless related scenario. Right now we are being forced to consider whether the president of the United States can legally order the military to murder “non-international” civilians he has unilaterally declared to be drug trafficking terrorists. 

On Friday morning, for the fourth time in a month, American forces launched a strike on a boat off the coast of Venezuela that the administration claimed was trafficking drugs. Four people were killed, bringing the total number of casualties from all four strikes to 21. 

As he has done with each operation, Trump took to Truth Social to brag: “A boat loaded with enough drugs to kill 25 TO 50 THOUSAND PEOPLE was stopped, early this morning off the Coast of Venezuela, from entering American Territory.” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth chimed in on X, “Four male narco-terrorists aboard the vessel were killed in the strike and no U.S. forces were harmed in the operation.”

No evidence has been provided about the alleged drug trafficking operations. When questions have been raised about the legality of the strikes, the administration has brushed them aside. Vice President JD Vance even joked that there probably aren’t any fishermen in the area anymore. “I don’t give a s**t,” he posted on X in response to concerns about the strikes.

Congress, though, apparently does. After asking politely if they could please see some sort of legal justification for the actions, the administration finally found time to send notice, as required by law, of a military action they are now defining as an active “armed conflict” with drug cartels. On Oct. 2, the New York Times reported the president’s decision that we are formally at war, and acknowledged the serious implications of such a position. 

Charlie Savage and Eric Schmitt wrote, “Mr. Trump’s move to formally deem his campaign against drug cartels as an active armed conflict means he is cementing his claim to extraordinary wartime powers, legal specialists said. In an armed conflict, as defined by international law, a country can lawfully kill enemy fighters even when they pose no threat, detain them indefinitely without trials and prosecute them in military courts.”

But international law doesn’t apply here, at least according to Trump. The president, the Washington Post reported, has declared this to be a “non-international conflict [with] designated terrorist organizations” that have helped to kill U.S. citizens through drug smuggling. The attacks were provoked, he also claimed, using drugs as weapons instead of guns, and the U.S. is “[using] force in self-defense and the defense of others.”

By this logic, since Americans are voluntarily taking the alleged drugs, does that make drug users material supporters of terrorism?

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Geoffrey S. Corn, a retired judge advocate general lawyer and former Army senior adviser for law-of-war issues, stated the obvious to the Times: That selling a dangerous product is different from an armed attack: 

Noting that it is illegal for the military to deliberately target civilians who are not directly participating in hostilities — even suspected criminals — Mr. Corn called the president’s move an “abuse” that crossed a major legal line.

“This is not stretching the envelope,” he said. “This is shredding it. This is tearing it apart.”

What else is new? Since we have not heard of any member of the military objecting to this action, it would seem that the reassurances we all received that the military would never agree to undertake an illegal order were a bit overblown. They are murdering civilians on the high seas on the president’s order. Just as in the Seal Team Six scenario, the president’s pardon power is also plenary, so there’s no exposure there either. 

This operation appears to be a Stephen Miller special, coming from his role as the head of the Homeland Security Council, which he successfully parlayed into a stand-alone entity instead of reporting to National Security Adviser (and Secretary of State) Marco Rubio. During Trump’s first term, Miller famously asked why the president couldn’t order migrants in boats to be killed. He was told then that such an act was illegal. All these years later, the response has apparently not dampened his enthusiasm for the idea.

As I noted in September, Rubio has seen these actions as a way to pursue his white whale: Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Along with Miller and CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Rubio is now pressing for direct military action against Venezuela — predicated, one assumes, on the assertion that Maduro is directing the drug traffickers, despite findings by America’s own spy agencies that he is not. In planning that strongly echoes the ill-fated invasion of Iraq, Rubio is working with exiled opposition politicians on day-after regime change plans. And just like with that debacle, the administration is relying on bogus legal theories, manipulation of evidence and lies to justify their actions. 

Apparently, some lessons have to be learned over and over again. 

There are many motivations for what’s about to happen; drugs are just the excuse. Rubio has a vendetta against Maduro, Miller wants to punish foreigners and Trump wants to show that he has the biggest, most powerful trigger finger in the world. Overriding all of it is what the president has said many times: “To the victors belong the spoils.” 

And as the Times pointed out about what sad fate likely awaits Venezuelans, “with its oil, gold and other minerals, there are many spoils.”