A White House official made a startling admission on the implications of President Donald Trump’s policy on designating drug traffickers as terrorists, an admission made in the wake of the deadly U.S. precision strike on a supposed drug vessel in the Caribbean on Tuesday.
Speaking with Axios in a report published Thursday, a senior official championed Trump’s executive order that designated drug cartels as terrorists, permitting the administration to carry out execution-style strikes on suspected drug traffickers, strikes that have been widely condemned as amounting to murder.
Given that the Justice Department indicted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro on narco-terrorism corruption and drug trafficking charges back in 2020, Axios reporter Marc Caputo asked officials whether that means Maduro could be assassinated in a similar fashion.
“Administration officials say that possibility hasn't been seriously discussed, but Trump is keeping it as an option,” Caputo wrote after having spoken with who he described as a “senior official.”
That official also bragged that the deadly strike on Tuesday was just one of many, and that the Trump administration continues to carry out strikes “weekly” that are unknown to the public.
"The National Security Council has taken out nearly 300 jihadists," the senior official told Axios. "We are conducting strikes against terrorists weekly that no one even knows about."
There is no precedent for the United States having officially assassinated a foreign head of state, though several, unofficial attempts have been made throughout history, perhaps most notably with the multiple failed attempts on the life of Cuban Prime Minister Fidel Castro, largely undertaken by the CIA.