MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
More than 80 people have now been killed by U.S. strikes on suspected drug boats. There are growing questions about an order to kill two of those people - whether it amounts to a war crime.
Here's what we know. On September 2, the U.S. carried out two strikes on a boat in the Caribbean. The second killed two remaining survivors. Details of that second strike were first reported by The Washington Post last week. Today, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, quote, "authorized" Admiral Frank Bradley to conduct both strikes, that Admiral Bradley issued the order and, quote, "worked well within his authority and the law."
Well, on Capitol Hill, both the Senate and the House Armed Services Committees are asking for a full accounting, and among the lawmakers asking, Virginia Democrat Tim Kaine. We've reached him at Capitol Hill. Senator, thanks for being with us.
TIMOTHY KAINE: Mary Louise, glad to talk today.
KELLY: How clear are you on details of what exactly happened, with this second strike killing two people who had initially survived?
KAINE: Mary Louise, it's very murky. I think up here, the - I'm on the two most relevant committees, Armed Services and Foreign Relations, and we're very, very troubled - and it's a bipartisan concern - about the reporting of the second strike that killed these survivors. And so there are many, many unanswered questions about...
KELLY: There is a video of these strikes.
KAINE: ...The entire mission (inaudible).
KELLY: It sounds like you haven't seen it.
KAINE: I have not seen the video. That's correct.
KELLY: You've asked to see it?
KAINE: I've asked a whole series of questions that I have not gotten answers to. I asked a series of questions in a letter dated September 10, and most of my questions have not been answered.
KELLY: If this September 2 - if the first and second strikes happened as The Washington Post has reported it, as NPR and others have confirmed, would it be illegal? Would it be a war crime?
KAINE: Well, on the legality, Mary Louise, let's start with the first strike. I have maintained since these strikes began that there's no legal authorization for them. And I have reviewed the Office of Legal Counsel classified opinion setting out a legal rationale. Because it's classified I can't discuss its contents, but I can say I found it completely unpersuasive that this mission is lawful at all.
But onto the second strike. Set aside the first strike - whether these missions are legally authorized. The second strike, if you go after survivors of an attack and you kill them, that is a clear violation of both DOD Law of War Manual and international conventions about the treatment of wounded combatants. And so if the reporting is correct - that on orders from the secretary of defense a strike was made to kill the survivors of this first attack - if that reporting is correct, it's a war crime under both American law and international law.
KELLY: And just to be as clear as we can be with, as we're acknowledging, limited data - we haven't seen this video of what actually happened - but the importance of it being a second strike. I mean, if the U.S. is - has made a decision, an order has been given, attack this boat, kill everybody on it, the detail of the second strike is because they survived. You're supposed to - what? - take them prisoner of war, give them...
KAINE: Yes.
KELLY: ...Some opportunity to plead their case?
KAINE: Yes. You're supposed to take them prisoner and then you decide. I mean, here's another fact that a lot of folks have focused (ph) on. There was a subsequent strike where there were survivors - one Colombian and one Ecuadoran. The administration picked them up and then returned them to Colombia or Ecuador. If they were narcotraffickers, why weren't they arrested? Why weren't they put on trial or pressured to reveal their higher-ups? Why were they sent back to Colombia and Ecuador, where they were released back into the civilian population? That fact on a subsequent strike raises real questions about whether we're even striking combatants or whether we're striking people claiming that they're narcotraffickers when they're actually not.
KELLY: So again, the administration is defending these strikes - says they are legal. The defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, has said the intent of these strikes - I'm quoting a post he put up on X - the intent of the strikes is to stop lethal drugs, destroy narco boats and kill the narco-terrorists who are poisoning the American people. Senator Kaine, what's wrong with that?
KAINE: That would be a great rationale if you presented it to Congress and let Congress vote that we should be at war to do just that. Our Constitution makes very plain that war is initiated by Congress. Once initiated, the president, secretary of defense and others are the commander-in-chief that implement the initiation of war. But war is not for the president to decide. The framers of our Constitution decided that, Mary Louise, when George Washington was president. They didn't even want George Washington to unilaterally take the nation to war, and they certainly wouldn't want Donald Trump doing it either.
KELLY: I want to talk about the War Powers Resolution that you were planning to reintroduce. This would require congressional approval for military force in the Caribbean. You did try to get that through this fall. You couldn't get enough of your colleagues to support it. What has changed?
KAINE: Mary Louise, there's two separate resolutions. They're very closely related. One deals with boat strikes in international waters in the Caribbean and the Pacific. And you're right, we filed that. Adam Schiff was the lead sponsor. I was his co-sponsor. We got two Republican votes. We needed at least four. I then led a similar resolution - no war in Venezuela or against Venezuela without congressional approval. We got two Republicans. We needed at least four. Both of those resolutions, though, were voted on for a lot of the subsequent developments. So with the Venezuela situation - the amassing of troops around Venezuela, the president closing the airspace, announcing that he's authorized covert operations - this has escalated dramatically.
KELLY: Right.
KAINE: And similarly, the strikes in the Caribbean and Pacific, including with the revelation about the second strike, the retirement - the early retirement of the SOUTHCOM commander, the decision by the U.K. to stop sharing intelligence with us - Congress needs to assert control here.
KELLY: Virginia Democrat Tim Kaine. As you heard, he sits on the Senate Armed Services and Foreign Affairs committees. Senator, thank you.
KAINE: You bet. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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