House Foreign Affairs Committee Ranking Member Meeks Demands Answers on and Legal Justification for Strike in Caribbean

Washington, D.C. – Representative Gregory W. Meeks, Ranking Member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, today issued a statement on the Trump administration’s September 2nd strike on a vessel in the Caribbean Sea.

“I am deeply concerned by the Trump administration’s shifting narratives, contradictory facts, and utter failure to provide a legal justification for this strike. It is unacceptable that, a week after the strike, Members of the Foreign Affairs Committee have yet to be briefed by the administration on this use of force despite the Committee’s clear jurisdiction.

"We are a nation of laws, not of one man’s whims. Donald Trump does not have the authority to order strikes in international waters. Only Congress has the constitutional power to declare war or authorize military force. The administration must make its legal justification for these strikes clear, because this strike appears unlawful under both U.S. and international law.

“The administration must also provide Congress the intelligence, including what immediate threat to the United States justified the extrajudicial killing of 11 individuals. Unjustified unilateral actions like this emulate the behavior of authoritarian leaders such as Maduro rather than counter them.

“The Trump administration’s credibility is already in tatters, from deporting people to foreign gulags based on false claims and cherry-picking intelligence that suits its political agenda, to now contradicting itself about where the boat was heading when it was struck. The American people deserve the truth.

“With both the United States and Venezuela taking further escalatory steps, it is time for Congress to reassert its congressional authority over matters of war and peace. We cannot allow Donald Trump to unilaterally drag us into a war that we have not authorized.”