Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) criticized the Trump administration on Monday after U.S. forces carried out a strike on a vessel in the Southern Caribbean, calling the action unconstitutional and a violation of international law.
In a statement, Omar said the military operation—reportedly targeting individuals linked to Venezuela and the criminal group Tren de Aragua—was ordered without congressional authorization. “Congress has not declared war on Venezuela, or Tren de Aragua, and the mere designation of a group as a terrorist organization does not give any President carte blanche to ignore Congress’s clear Constitutional authority on matters of war and peace,” she said.
The strike, which the Trump administration defended by citing drug-trafficking concerns, was showcased in a video posted by the president and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Omar questioned the justification for the action, noting that “US forces that were recently sent to the region in an escalatory and provocative manner were under no threat from the boat they attacked.”
Unless evidence emerges that the strike was conducted in self-defense, Omar argued, it represents “a clear violation of international law.” She accused the administration of weaponizing the decades-long “war on drugs” to justify reckless military intervention.
“The U.S. posture towards the eradication of drugs has caused immeasurable damage across our hemisphere,” she said, pointing to mass displacement, environmental destruction, violence, and human rights abuses. Despite decades of enforcement, Omar noted, drug cartels remain powerful and narcotrafficking operations have not been diminished.
Labeling the drug war a “dramatic, profound failure at every level,” Omar said even conservative leaders in Latin America now acknowledge its shortcomings. “Trump and Rubio’s apparent solution, to make it even more militarized, is doomed to fail,” she added.
Omar warned that escalating military actions risk entangling the United States in an “endless, pointless conflict” of the very kind Trump has long claimed to oppose. “There is no conceivable legal justification for this use of force,” she concluded, calling on Congress to reassert its constitutional authority over matters of war and peace.
