“If the reports are true, then a war crime was committed,” Lieu posted to X. “Also, there is generally no statute of limitations for war crimes.”
“The United States Armed Forces and [United States Southern Command] are not your sicarios,” tweeted Adam Isacson, who is the director for defense oversight at the Washington Office on Latin America. “You can’t just order them to carry out illegal hits on noncombatants and kill survivors. Issue all the secret memos you want, granting immunity through legal contortions. These are still crimes, and won’t stand.”
Hegseth’s defense of the attack on alleged drug traffickers came on the same day that President Donald Trump announced he was pardoning former Honduras President Juan Orlando Hernández, who was serving a 45-year federal prison sentence for drug trafficking. Hernández was convicted of conspiring to traffic 400 tons of cocaine into the United States.