On November 5, 2025, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth arrived at the U.S. Capitol for a briefing with congressional leaders and Secretary of State Marco Rubio on military strikes against suspected drug trafficking vessels in the Caribbean. Tom Williams via Getty Images
WASHINGTON — The White House on Monday shifted responsibility for the killing of survivors of a U.S. military strike on a suspected drug-smuggling ship from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to a Navy admiral.
In the U.S. Department of Defense Law of War Manual, killing the survivors of a destroyed ship is actually an example of a war crime. “For example, an order to fire on a victim is clearly illegal,” the manual reads.
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However, press secretary Carolyn Leavitt has repeatedly said it was legal — though she further claimed, as President Donald Trump did on Sunday, that Hegseth had no idea it was happening.
“On September 2, Secretary Hegseth authorized Adm. Bradley to conduct these kinetic strikes. Adm. Bradley performed well within the scope of his authority and within the law, directing the engagement to ensure the destruction of this ship and the elimination of the threat to the United States of America,” she said.
Frank Bradley was the head of Joint Special Operations Command at the time of the attack off the coast of Trinidad. According to the Washington Post, it was he who delivered Hegseth’s “kill everyone” order, sending SEALs back to the disabled ship and telling them to kill the two men clinging to the wreckage.
In October, Bradley was promoted to commander of U.S. Special Operations Command.
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Levitt directed further questions to the “War Department,” Trump’s nickname for the Pentagon.
However, an official there said they could provide no more information beyond statements Hegseth had made on social media in recent days, where he called the Post report “fake news” and recently posted a cartoon defending the killing of an alleged smuggler.
U.S. Special Operations Command officials did not respond to inquiries from The Huffington Post.
Later Monday night, Hegseth issued a statement on social media confirming that Bradley, not him, ordered the second strike.
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“I support him and his decision to fight – both for the mission on September 2 and for all others since then,” Heggs wrote.
Three months ago, Trump posted part of a video of the September 2 attack on his social media platform, boasting that the attack killed 11 “narco-terrorists.”
There were 11 people on board, suggesting that the ship was not actually smuggling drugs, as each additional unnecessary passenger reduced the ship’s drug payload by an average of 180 pounds. Most other attacks on suspected drug boats have had three or four people on board.
Trump and his administration’s explanation for the series of attacks on small boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific has been misleading from the start and may even be outright wrong.
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Trump has repeatedly claimed the attack was aimed at stemming the flow of fentanyl into the United States, and at times said fentanyl was on board the destroyed ships. In fact, the government has provided no evidence that any fentanyl was on any of the vessels, which is largely consistent with vessels used by smugglers of low-level cocaine.
Trump further claimed that the ships and their crews were en route to the United States when the attack occurred. This is also wrong. The ships are too small to reach the United States without repeated refueling and are not suitable for long ocean voyages.
Over the Thanksgiving holiday, Trump pardoned the former president of Honduras, adding a layer of hypocrisy to his policy of cracking down on smugglers. The former president was convicted in a U.S. federal court for directing the smuggling of approximately 500 tons of cocaine into the United States.
Leavitt defended the pardon on Monday, repeating Trump’s baseless claims that Juan Orlando Hernandez was unfairly prosecuted by Trump’s predecessor, Democrat Joe Biden.
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“His court-appointed attorneys have only three weeks to prepare for trial. He says his conviction is the law of the left, citing an agreement the left party made with the Biden-Harris administration,” she said. “So the president heard the concerns of many people, as he did, and of course he has the constitutional authority to sign pardons for people he deems worthy.”
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