On the menu today: Are you having trouble keeping track of the Trump administration’s evolving explanation of what happened on the first U.S. military strike against an allegedly drug-running boat off the coast of Venezuela over the past three months? Read on.
What the Trump Team Has Said About the Venezuela Boat Strikes
On September 2 — or September 1, according to the Venezuelan exile newspaper El Nacional — the U.S. military destroyed a boat as it approached a strait of water separating Venezuela and Trinidad and Tobago called “Bocas del Dragon,” or “The Dragon’s Mouths.” That strait is roughly 1,600 miles from the southern tip of Florida.
One local Spanish-language publication described the boat as “a flipper, a speedboat approximately 12 meters long and 2.5 meters wide, equipped with four 200-horsepower engines.” Venezuelan journalist Sebastiana Barráez reported that before being intercepted by the U.S. military, the men threw some of the cargo overboard.
Here are the explanations from Trump administration officials about that strike, from the first announcement:
3:30 p.m. Eastern, September 2: President Trump, during a White House event announcing the relocation of Space Command to Alabama, said: “When you come out and you leave the room, you’ll see that we just, over the last few minutes, literally shot out a boat, a drug-carrying boat, a lot of drugs on that boat . . . — these came out of Venezuela. And coming out very heavily from Venezuela — a lot of things are coming out of Venezuela. So, we took it out and you’ll get to see that after this meeting is over.”
5:22 p.m., September 2: President Trump posted on Truth Social: “Earlier this morning, on my Orders, U.S. Military Forces conducted a kinetic strike against positively identified Tren de Aragua Narcoterrorists in the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility. . . . The strike resulted in 11 terrorists killed in action. No U.S. Forces were harmed in this strike. Please let this serve as notice to anybody even thinking about bringing drugs into the United States of America. BEWARE!”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, speaking to reporters at Homestead Air Reserve Base in Florida, September 2, said: “These particular drugs were probably headed to Trinidad or some other country in the Caribbean, at which point they just contribute to the instability these countries are facing.”
September 3: Secretary of State Rubio in a press conference in Mexico City, Mexico, said: “The same information and the same intelligence mechanisms with maybe a higher focus was used to determine that a drug boat was headed towards, eventually, the United States, and instead of interdicting it, on the President’s orders, he blew it up. . . . They pose an immediate threat to the United States, period. If you’re on a boat full of cocaine or fentanyl or whatever headed to the United States, you’re an immediate threat to the United States.”
[Note that the fentanyl that ends up in the United States doesn’t really come from Venezuela; it’s mostly from China and Mexico. The State Department annual report on drug smuggling published in March concluded, “Companies in [the People’s Republic of China] remain the largest source of precursor chemicals and equipment used to manufacture illicit fentanyl and other synthetic drugs in Mexico and other countries.” It also found that Mexico was “the most significant source of illicit fentanyl and fentanyl analogues significantly affecting the United States in 2024.” However, Venezuela is a major source of cocaine trafficking.]
September 3: Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, appearing on Fox and Friends: “I watched it live. We knew exactly who was in boat, we knew exactly what they were doing, and we know exactly who they represented. What they represented, that is Tren de Aragua, designated by the United States for trying to poison our country with illicit drugs.”
September 10: The New York Times reported, “A Venezuelan boat that the U.S. military destroyed in the Caribbean last week had altered its course and appeared to have turned around before the attack started because the people onboard had apparently spotted a military aircraft stalking it, according to American officials familiar with the matter. The military repeatedly hit the vessel before it sank, the officials added, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter.”
September 11: The Associated Press reported, “National security officials acknowledged during a closed briefing this week on Capitol Hill that the boat carrying 11 people, described by the Trump administration as Tren de Aragua gang members, was fired on multiple times by the U.S. military after it had changed course, according to two people familiar with the situation who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the private meeting.”
October 6: GOP Senator Roger Wicker of Mississippi and Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the chairman and ranking member of the Armed Services Committee, wrote to Secretary Hegseth requesting “unedited video of the three lethal strikes conducted in the southern Caribbean Sea on September 2, 15, and 19.” As of this writing, the committee has not received any unedited video.
On October 8, Reed contended during a speech on the floor of the Senate, “The administration has offered no positive identification for those killed, nor any information linking the boat crews to cartels. In fact, they have not proven that these vessels were engaged in drug trafficking, nor even that they were destined for the United States.”
October 29: The Trump administration organized a Republican-only Senate classified briefing “on the escalating military strikes targeting alleged Venezuelan drug trafficking boats.” “Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., said he did not know that the briefing was for Republicans only until he got there, and was surprised that was the case. ‘I would have preferred it to have been bipartisan,’ Rounds said, ‘which is normally the way we do things within the Intelligence Committee and also Armed Services.’”
November 28: The Washington Post reported: “The Special Operations commander overseeing the Sept. 2 attack — the opening salvo in the Trump administration’s war on suspected drug traffickers in the Western Hemisphere — ordered a second strike to comply with Hegseth’s instructions, two people familiar with the matter said. The two men were blown apart in the water.”
The Post article also included a description of why the survivors were deemed legitimate targets for a second strike:
The commander overseeing the operation from Fort Bragg in North Carolina, Adm. Frank M. “Mitch” Bradley, told people on the secure conference call that the survivors were still legitimate targets because they could theoretically call other traffickers to retrieve them and their cargo, according to two people. He ordered the second strike to fulfill Hegseth’s directive that everyone must be killed.
In the article, the Post quotes a statement from Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell: “This entire narrative is completely false.”
November 30, President Trump, speaking to reporters on Air Force One, when asked about a second strike, answered:
I don’t know that that happened. And Pete said he did not want them. He didn’t even know what they were talking about. So we’ll look at, we’ll look into it, but no, I wouldn’t have wanted that. Not a second strike. Uh, the first strike was very lethal. It was fine that, if there were two people around, but Pete said that didn’t happen. . . . I’ve gotta find out about it. But, uh, Pete said he did not order the death of those two men.
Also note that on that day, Ohio GOP Representative Mike Turner, a member of the House Armed Services Committee, appeared on Face the Nation and said of killing survivors, “Obviously, if that occurred, that would be — be very serious, and I agree that that would — would be an illegal act.”
December 1: Secretary Hegseth posting on X: “Let’s make one thing crystal clear: Admiral Mitch Bradley is an American hero, a true professional, and has my 100% support. I stand by him and the combat decisions he has made — on the September 2 mission and all others since.”
December 1: White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, during the press briefing, said: “With respect to the strikes in question, on September 2nd, Secretary Hegseth authorized Admiral Bradley to conduct these kinetic strikes.”
December 2, Secretary Hegseth in a cabinet meeting:
So, I said I’m going to be the one to make the call after getting all the information and make sure it’s the right strike. That was September 2nd. There’s a lot of intelligence that goes into that, building that case and understanding that, a lot of people providing information. I watched that first strike live.
So, I didn’t stick around for the hour and two hours or whatever where all the sensitive site exploitation digitally occurs. So I moved on to my next meeting. A couple of hours later, I learned that that commander had made the — which he had the complete authority to do. And by the way, Admiral Bradley made the correct decision to ultimately sink the boat and eliminate the threat.
I did not personally see survivors, but I stand — because the thing was on fire. That was exploded and fire or smoke, you can’t see anything. You got digital. This is called the fog of war.
Also in that cabinet meeting, President Trump said:
Somebody asked me a question about the second strike, I didn’t know about the second strike. I didn’t know anything about people. I wasn’t involved in it. I knew they took out a boat, but I would say this, they had a strike.
President Trump said, referring of Admiral Bradley:
He’s an extraordinary person. I’ll let Pete speak about him, but Pete was satisfied. Pete didn’t know about second attack having to do with two people, and I guess Pete would have to speak to it.
Depending upon which administration official you’re listening to or when, the boat was “headed to Trinidad or some other country in the Caribbean,” and it was also “an immediate threat to the United States.” It remained an “immediate threat” even after it turned around. The president said that Hegseth told him a second strike on survivors “didn’t happen.” Hegseth said he “watched that first strike live” and also said he “did not personally see survivors.” Hegseth is “going to be the one to make the call” and also simultaneously, “Admiral Bradley made the correct decision to ultimately sink the boat and eliminate the threat.” The target of the second strike was the cargo, or the target of the second strike were the survivors, to ensure they did not call anyone to pick them up and retrieve the cargo. Also, President Trump said he wouldn’t have wanted a second strike on survivors.
And the entire narrative of a second strike is “completely false,” according to the Pentagon spokesman, except for the parts that were later corroborated.
No doubt, there are plenty of Democrats and members of the media want to create as many headaches as possible for the Trump administration. But the administration creates problems for itself when it does not give a straight story, based upon verifiable facts, from day one. And unsurprisingly, members of Congress — both Democrats and Republicans — get hostile quickly when they feel like their requests for additional information are being ignored or rejected.
ADDENDUM: The Associated Press has put together its list of the ten most notable books of 2025.
Independent, by former White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, made the list.
Mind you, this isn’t the list of the top ten books about the Biden administration published this year, the top ten political memoirs of the year, or even the top ten nonfiction books of the year. This is the AP’s list of the most notable books of every category, putting Jean-Pierre right next to the latest Hunger Games prequel, the posthumous memoir by one of Jeffrey Epstein’s victims, and Mel Robbins’s The Let Them Theory.
Recall that during the book tour, Jean-Pierre insisted that even as an octogenarian, Joe Biden could have served another four years and ably performed his duties. (Again, the man turned 83 years old last month and is getting radiation therapy for prostate cancer.) She’s insisted the Biden administration had no scandals, and that Biden had done a great job.
Was this a rebuilding year for notable books or something?