Congressman Gregory W. Meeks of Queens.
Photograph by Paul Frangipane
Queens Democratic Congressman Gregory W. Meeks, the rating member of the US Home of Representatives’ Overseas Affairs Committee, is demanding solutions from the Trump administration for the authorized justification for the US Armed Forces’ strike on an alleged drug vessel within the Caribbean Sea.
“I’m deeply involved by the Trump administration’s shifting narratives, contradictory info, and utter failure to supply a authorized justification for this strike,” Meeks, who represents New York’s 5th Congressional District in Queens, mentioned on Tuesday, Sept. 9.
“It’s unacceptable that, per week after the strike, Members of the Overseas Affairs Committee have but to be briefed by the administration on this use of power, regardless of the Committee’s clear jurisdiction,” added Meeks, who previously served because the chairman of the Home Overseas Affairs Committee. “We’re a nation of legal guidelines, not of 1 man’s whims.
“Donald Trump doesn’t have the authority to order strikes in worldwide waters,” the congressman continued. “Solely Congress has the constitutional energy to declare struggle or authorize navy power. The administration should make its authorized justification for these strikes clear, as a result of this strike seems illegal beneath each US and worldwide regulation.”
Meeks additionally desires the Trump administration to supply Congress intelligence, together with what quick risk to the USA justified the extrajudicial killing of 11 people.
“Unjustified unilateral actions like this emulate the habits of authoritarian leaders, akin to Maduro (the Venezuelan chief), reasonably than counter them,” he mentioned.
“The Trump administration’s credibility is already in tatters, from deporting individuals to international gulags based mostly on false claims and cherry-picking intelligence that fits its political agenda, to now contradicting itself about the place the boat was heading when it was struck,” Meeks added. “The American individuals deserve the reality.
“With each the USA and Venezuela taking additional escalatory steps, it’s time for Congress to reassert its congressional authority over issues of struggle and peace,” he continued. “We can’t permit Donald Trump to unilaterally drag us right into a struggle that we’ve got not approved.”
As pressure rises between the USA and Venezuela over the deployment of US navy forces within the Caribbean Sea off Venezuela allegedly to fight narco-trafficking, the Trump administration on Sept. 8 reaffirmed the power of its partnership with the Trinidad and Tobago Authorities of Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar.
US Division of State Principal Deputy Spokesperson Tommy Piggott mentioned on Sept. 8 that Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau spoke with Persad-Bissessar “to reaffirm the power of the US–Trinidad and Tobago partnership.
“The Deputy Secretary recommended Trinidad and Tobago as a robust US associate within the Caribbean,” mentioned Piggott in an announcement. “He acknowledged Prime Minister Persad-Bissessar’s public help for US navy operations within the South Caribbean Sea and each our governments’ dedication to curbing unlawful narcotics and firearms trafficking.”
Final week, Persad-Bissessar applauded Trump’s navy build-up within the Caribbean Sea off Venezuela, because the US navy struck an alleged drug boat, killing “11 terrorists.”
“I, together with a lot of the nation, am completely satisfied that the US naval deployment is having success of their mission,” mentioned Persad-Bissessar in an announcement. “The ache and struggling the cartels have inflicted on our nation is immense.
“I’ve no sympathy for traffickers; the US navy ought to kill all of them violently,” she declared.
Trump disclosed on his social media platform that he ordered US Armed Forces to strike a ship that they claimed was carrying alleged Tren de Aragua drug smugglers within the Caribbean Sea.
“You had huge quantities of medicine. We’ve tapes of them talking,” mentioned Trump in Oval Workplace remarks on Sept. 3. “It was huge quantities of medicine coming into our nation to kill lots of people.
“You see it, you see the luggage of medicine everywhere in the boat, and so they had been hit,” he added. “Clearly, they received’t be doing it once more. And I feel a whole lot of different individuals received’t be doing it once more.”
US Protection Secretary Pete Hegseth doubled down, stating on Fox Information: “We knew precisely who was in that boat. We knew precisely what they had been doing, and we knew precisely who they represented.
“And that was Tren de Aragua narco-terrorist group designated by the USA as attempting to poison our nation with illicit medication,” he added. “Anybody else trafficking in these waters who we all know is a lethal terrorist will face the identical destiny.”
On Sept. 8, Hegseth made an unanticipated go to to Puerto Rico, as Trump heightens navy build-up within the Caribbean beneath the pretext of combatting drug cartels.
Accompanied by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Employees, Air Power Gen. Dan Caine, Hegseth informed US Marines deployed in Puerto Rico that they had been entrance and middle in “defending the American homeland.”
