The following is a lightly edited transcript of the December 2 episode of the Daily Blast podcast. Listen to it here.
Greg Sargent: This is The Daily Blast from The New Republic, produced and presented by the DSR Network. I’m your host, Greg Sargent.
President Trump’s illegal boat bombings in the Caribbean Sea just got much worse. We’ve now learned that after demolishing a boat allegedly carrying drug smugglers in September, two survivors were left behind and they were both blown apart in a second strike. This is probably a war crime. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt faced reporters’ questions about this on Monday and tried to spin all of it as perfectly lawful. But all she ended up revealing is how hard it is for the administration to justify its acts when actual facts about them are known. We’re working through all this with Jennifer Rubin, co-founder and editor-in-chief of The Contrarian, who has a good piece laying all this out. Jen, great to have you back on.
Jennifer Rubin: It’s great to be here, Greg.
Sargent: So here’s what we know. The Washington Post reports that on September 2nd, after the U.S. blew up a boat carrying 11 people allegedly smuggling drugs, A live drone feed then showed two survivors in the water clinging to the wreckage. Then a second strike was ordered which blew the men apart in the water. This is a blatant, reprehensible violation of the laws of war. Jen, I wanted to get your reaction just to these facts.
Rubin: Well, two things. First of all, Pete Hegseth had previously made an assertion that we were to give no quarter, which is generally considered to be take no prisoners, kill everyone. That is in and of itself a blatantly illegal act. The second issue is it’s not clear we’re even in a war, and you need a war in order to have a war crime. The reason we’re arguably not in a war is, number one, Congress has not declared a war. And number two, there is no evidence whatsoever that these people on boats are armed or in an armed conflict with the United States or presenting any kind of imminent threat. What that means is, if we’re not even at war, then the unjustified killing of another human being is murder. And that can be punished both under military law and civilian law. If we are at war, as you said, this violates a very fundamental precept called hors de combat—meaning if someone is injured on the battlefield or shipwrecked, you can’t then go kill them. And that is, if the reporting is accurate, what appears to have been the case.
Sargent: Right, and so what we now know from the Post’s reporting is that the commander who gave this order for a second strike, whose name is Frank Bradley, was fulfilling a spoken order from Pete Hegseth to kill them all. That’s what the Post reports. Hegseth reportedly denied to the president that he gave that order. A reporter asked White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt about this. Listen to this exchange.
Reporter (voicever): Does the administration deny that that second strike happened? Or did it happen and the administration denies that Secretary Hegseth gave the order?
Karoline Leavitt (voiceover): The latter is true, Abe. And I have a statement to read for you here. President Trump and Secretary Hegseth have made it clear that presidentially designated narco-terrorist groups are subject to lethal targeting in accordance with the laws of war. With respect to the strikes in question on September 2nd, Secretary Hegseth authorized Admiral Bradley to conduct these kinetic strikes. Admiral Bradley worked well within his authority and the law directing the engagement to ensure the boat was destroyed and the threat to the United States of America was eliminated.
Sargent: Jen, so there Leavitt confirms Hegseth’s denial that he said the precise words kill them all and yet Leavitt also confirms that the strike did happen while claiming it was entirely within the laws of war. What do you make of that?
Rubin: Well, if we are to believe her, they are throwing the admiral who ordered the strike under the bus. Now, by the way, because he should and clearly does know the laws of war—even if he were given that order—his failure to object and his carrying it out would still be either a war crime or murder, because there is simply no defense for this. Strangely enough, this is what those six congressmen and senators were talking about in the video that freaked out Donald Trump. Perhaps we now know why. Once you have an order that is blatantly illegal—and this is blatantly illegal—your obligation under military law, under domestic law, is to refuse to follow it.
Sargent: Yeah, I want to throw this in here, Jen. You got at this in your piece. But Jack Goldsmith—who is not exactly a liberal; he was the head of the Office of Legal Counsel under Republicans—he actually made the same point in a very careful analysis. He said that if the Post’s facts are right, then Admiral Bradley was under an obligation to not carry out the order to kill them all, right? I just want to make one other point about this real quick, Jen, and get your reaction to it. What Leavitt is essentially saying is the strike did happen, and then she’s sort of fudging on whether it was the result of Hegseth’s order or not—the second strike, I mean—and then saying that second strike is legal. Right? I don’t see how the argument is tenable at all.
Rubin: Correct. Now, two things. One, it’s not clear whether she’s disputing that he said give no quarter, which is essentially the same as kill them all. As we just said, however, that’s not relevant to whether Bradley committed an illegal act. I cannot imagine any set of facts in which this is lawful. And we don’t like to make the Nazi analogy, except where it’s relevant. And in this case, there actually happens to be a case from World War II, which I cite in my piece, in which a Nazi U-boat struck—blew up—a Greek steamer. There were a number of survivors. The commander of the U-boat interrogated these people, presumably still in the water, and then ordered that his men fire grenades and machine guns to complete the sinking of the ship and kill these people. All but three were killed. The Nazis were tried for war crimes after the war, and five of them, including the commander, were convicted. The only difference between that case and our case is at least the Nazis knew they were at war. We don’t even know that. So it is baffling to me how any administration could justify this. I suspect they’re going to have to backtrack and come up with some other explanation like, The admiral got it wrong, he was acting out of school, and see what he then says in his own defense.
Sargent: Well, to that point, I want to parse Leavitt’s quotes a little more. What’s critical is that she distances Hegseth from delivering any order directing the final strike against the two men. As you point out, it’s true that she doesn’t really mention or deal with the fact that he’s, you know, made the no quarter claim, but she does seem to be saying that Hegseth didn’t actually say kill them all, right? So she only acknowledges that Hegseth ordered the destruction of the boat, which leaves Admiral Bradley holding the bag. Now, as we reported at TNR.com—you can check that out—Representative Adam Smith, ranking Democrat on the Armed Services Committee, now says Bradley is in talks about briefing the committee. Now, I don’t know if this is going to end up happening or not, but if it does, there are going to be some pretty important questions for Bradley now, right? What would you ask him?
Rubin: Well, first of all, if I were his lawyer, I would tell him to take the Fifth because he is in very serious legal jeopardy. And I suspect that either he or his lawyer or the Pentagon is not going to allow him to testify because they have a firm understanding of exactly what the problem is. Now, there is, of course, a whole nother level of liability here. Not only did the admiral undertake an illegal order, he was not the one who pushed the button. There were people below him who did that. So is he really trying to slough off responsibility on people junior to him? Is that really what they’re going to do? They’re going to give some low-level guy the responsibility for this? Well, I think that’s not going to work either. And I do not know, but I suspect that the information that the Post reported must have come from within the Pentagon and within the chain of command. Who else would have known about this? By the way, it’s very telling that they edited the video. If there was nothing wrong with this, if it was perfectly legal, why did they edit out that part? That is what we call consciousness of guilt.
Sargent: Well, Jen, I want to ask you about that because as far as I can tell, even if you accept what the White House has said thus far about this—what Karoline Leavitt has said thus far—it still appears that the second strike happened. Leavitt admits that. And as far as I can tell from the reporting and the totality of the public comments on this, there is video of the two men getting blown apart in the water, right? That exists. So at some point, the fact that that happened needs to face some kind of accountability, and the White House is sort of skirting their way around it. I don’t understand where this ends up, right? This happened. Isn’t that the essence of this? The two men were blown apart in the water.
Rubin: It did. And if everything was hunky-dory, why didn’t we see that when they released the original video? Why did they conceal that until now? So I think they need to answer that question. And I think the members of the Armed Services committees, both the House and the Senate, on a bipartisan basis, which have agreed to interview and to investigate this matter, need to understand—and I think they do understand because that’s why they’re on the Armed Services Committee—the severity of this, the seriousness of this. And remember, Donald Trump has a special place in his heart for war crimes. Do you remember that he pardoned individuals who were convicted of war crimes? Donald Trump and his trusty secretary seem to think that the sign of the warrior ethos, the sign of being a tough guy, means that you violate domestic law, international law, that you “kill them all.” That this is somehow what our military is about. This has never been what our military is about. And if we go down this road, then we really are no better than the heinous regimes of the past. I do not think they’re going to get very far with this argument, and someone is going to get thrown under the bus. It’s either going to be Bradley or Hegseth. And if Hegseth insists on saying he never told the admiral to do this, I think it will be a nanosecond before the admiral turns around and says, Yes, you did. And here’s the evidence.
Sargent: Well, I certainly think that’s very possible. I want to highlight one other nugget in the Post’s report and see what you think of it and where it might have come from. You’ve been around a long time; you know how these leaks work. So the Post says Bradley ordered the second strike because the survivors were “legitimate targets” as they could “theoretically call other traffickers to retrieve them and their cargo.” But Jack Goldsmith, the former OLC head, says that wouldn’t be an adequate rationale on the face of the laws of war, which the Defense Department is supposed to be bound to. And so it wouldn’t be kosher to say that. It wouldn’t be kosher to carry out this killing on that basis. And so somebody is leaking this. Who’s leaking this fact that this is what Bradley said?
Rubin: Well, one of two possibilities: either Bradley himself or somebody within the chain of command who is wildly spinning this, hoping to get the monkey off his or her back. Now, there’s a couple problems, of course, with that argument about they could have called for help. First of all, called for help with what? They were apparently clinging to a destroyed boat. So how would they have summoned it? They’re going to use telepathy to get people back? I think there are some things you can’t spin, and this may be one of them, in part because they have videotape of it.
Sargent: Apparently they do, right? And I want to highlight one other line from the Post which is absolutely wrenching. It says, “If the video of the blast that killed the two survivors on September 2 were made public, people would be horrified,” said one person who watched the live feed. So there you have it: There’s a video of this. And look, let’s face it: Something really horrible happened here—real executions in international waters, people were blown into pieces—two people who are utterly defenseless.
Rubin: Correct. And that also indicates—I do not believe there is anyone other than a military official who could have viewed that tape, unless we’re talking about a civilian lawyer from the White House or somebody else—but that would be really appalling. So again, who would have viewed this videotape? I got two possibilities, neither of which is very good: Either it’s a military individual or it’s a lawyer in the White House, a civilian lawyer of some type. Jen, someone deeply troubled by what happened. Correct. So this person is going to come forward, come hell or high water—excuse the pun—and they are trapped. So what they’re going to do about this, I don’t know. And the smarter thing for Trump to do, of course, would just be to say, I’m appalled. Hegseth is fired. The admiral is fired. They’re all in the brig. Let the military prosecute them. But he is incapable of admitting error. He is incapable of saying this person who everyone agreed was unqualified has now shown himself to be a war criminal. But that’s the only rational, the only really viable excuse he would have or action he would have. And he seems disinclined to take it. And you can understand why, because once he opens this up, then the whole ball of wax comes undone. What is Hegseth doing? What is Tulsi Gabbard doing there? What is Kristi Noem doing there? They’re all lawless folk who do not take the domestic laws or international laws that apply to everyone seriously.
Sargent: Absolutely. Let’s listen to one more exchange between a reporter and Karoline Leavitt.
Reporter (voiceover): You said that the follow-up strike was lawful. What law is it that allows no survivors?
Karoline Leavitt (voiceover): The strike conducted on September 2nd was conducted in self-defense to protect Americans and vital United States interests. The strike was conducted in international waters and in accordance with the law of armed conflict.
Sargent: Jen, there you have it. What Leavitt can’t explain is how it’s legal to have done the second strike. And as you point out, there is existing video of this and now clearly a reservoir of people inside—whether lawyers or military officials or both—who are appalled and horrified about what they’re seeing and clearly want more information to be known. There’s no way out for them that I can see here.
Rubin: No, and that’s why I come back to the position that Trump would be smart—and so far he’s proved to be a not very smart autocrat—to throw these guys all under the bus and get out of this. But of course, that puts into doubt his entire military escapade. And we are still left with that, which is that this entire thing is unjustified and illegal, that we do not have the right under international law to go blowing up boats that are not a threat to us, that pose no threat to us on some theory that if they reach their destination, they have products on board that could potentially harm Americans.
Sargent: The critical point at the end of the day that’s much bigger than this one horror as bad as it is, is that the entire thing is illegal. There’s no sense in which these people who are getting blown to bits in international waters are waging war against the United States. Drug smuggling is not war. It’s bad and you meet it with police actions, but you don’t execute the people on suspicion of doing this. That’s the thing that’s really illegal. So at the end of the day, how do we get to accountability? Presuming Trump is just going to try and say, you know, nothing bad happened here. Killing people to defend the United States is good. How do we get there?
Rubin: Well, thanks to the Supreme Court, he doesn’t have criminal liability. And conceivably, before leaving office, he could pardon everyone. Now, question whether that’s going to protect individuals from the international arm of justice and whether these people will ever be able to travel internationally without risking arrest and prosecution elsewhere. But really, the penalty for all of this—and we keep coming back to this in whatever context we’re in, Greg—is there has to be a political context. Ultimately, Congress and the American people have to decide: Is this the kind of government we want? And if we get any Democratic Congress, whether it’s the House and the Senate or just the House, they can certainly begin impeachment proceedings if Hegseth is still there, if Trump is still there and has committed impeachable acts. They can certainly, in a Democratic administration that would follow if they haven’t been pardoned, pursue criminal prosecution.
There is no statute of limitations on murder, and other federal crimes have a five-year statute of limitation. So there are short-term consequences; there are long-term consequences. But I would suggest to members of Congress, and specifically the Republicans who are already facing a tsunami for 2026: Is this really how they want to go down? Is this really what they want to defend? Or do they want to take the most obvious, the most blatant instance in which to show the American people: We are not simply stooges of Donald Trump. We take our jobs seriously. We take an oath to the Constitution. No, we don’t agree with that. And we will find that out sooner rather than later, because we’re going to see. Now, what’s interesting is the initial response to this from Republicans was extremely troubled. So I think it’s going to be hard for them to get out from under this. And all of this mumbo jumbo—this was in self-defense, we’re at war—none of this makes any sense. And I think ultimately it’s not going to work. I think there is going to be a price to be paid.
Sargent: Jen Rubin, I really, really hope so. At the very least though, you’ve laid out a very powerful case here for why these guys are really basically a regime of criminals. So good to talk to you as always.
Rubin: You too, Greg.