00:00President Trump's plan to go after narco-terrorists in the Caribbean is certainly making some waves.
00:06Don Bacon, a retired Air Force general turned GOP congressman,
00:10says the president may find smoother sailing if he includes Congress in the war plants.
00:18All right. So, Congressman, first question I had for you today,
00:22these suspected drug smugglers being labeled as unlawful combatants,
00:28you served in the Air Force for 30 years. You've been a congressman for 10.
00:35How do you view that label of unlawful combatants on some of these suspected smugglers?
00:43I've grappled with it a little bit. I'm not a lawyer.
00:46If I was President Trump, I would make sure this was well researched by the attorney general and the legal team around them.
00:54We've also got to make sure that these boats are indeed narco boats that are shipping drugs
01:02and are not accidentally misidentified because that would be terrible.
01:07That said, it's not a big stretch to go from going against Al-Qaeda and other terrorists
01:11and then looking at these folks who killed 100,000 Americans a year.
01:16So, I'm inclined to be supportive of the policy because I lost, you know,
01:21you may know I lost three brothers from drugs and alcohol.
01:25And so, I know a lot of people in Omaha died from fentanyl or their families, right?
01:30And so, I tend to be supportive of it, but it's not a clear-cut policy thing for me.
01:36I mean, it's stretching the norms once again.
01:39What could the president do to earn your full-fledged support in this kind of military operation?
01:48Like, what would it take for you to be like, yes, we're doing it the right way now?
01:52Well, take it to Congress in the end because we only have the War Powers Resolution.
01:56So, if he's going to continue going against these narco boats, we should do a War Powers Resolution.
02:02And it should be voted on by Congress.
02:05And I think this would give it legitimacy to do it that way.
02:09Like I said, we've gone against terrorists, but the Congress voted on it, right?
02:13We did that in 2001.
02:15And then we did it again in 2003 when we expanded it with Iraq.
02:19And so, I don't think it's a big stretch to go from terrorists to people running drugs in our country,
02:24killing 100,000 people a year.
02:26But I do think Congress should vote on it and probably use the War Powers Resolution.
02:32As a vehicle to do so.
02:35With that, I mean, critics are going to hear that and say,
02:37oh, that's going to open up the opportunity for another forever war.
02:41We just got out of Afghanistan not too long ago as a result of the 2001 attack.
02:48So, what's your response to, you know, if Congress's votes on it and War Powers Resolution is passed,
02:55what would Congress do or what would you hope Congress does?
02:59Because I know your time is running short in the House.
03:04But what would you hope that the body would do to make sure that it's not another forever war
03:09at the expense of the American taxpayer?
03:13Well, I don't think we should be going into Venezuela or at least any kind of ground operation.
03:18But I think if we're strictly interdicting boats and trying to interdict the drugs coming into our country,
03:23I already believe that some of the gangs or the narco organizations out there are probably thinking,
03:32rethinking how they're getting drugs in our country.
03:34because you hit three boats and they're like, you know, we don't want to die here doing this.
03:39I saw this as deterrence.
03:41You go after a few and then maybe you can stop these shipments from coming in.
03:45A lot of these boats go into Guatemala, Honduras, and they go up through Mexico.
03:50So, I suppose going after the drug routes I think is good.
03:55I mean, I think it's 100,000 people a year dying.
03:59You think about it, we lost 58,000 people in Vietnam over 10 years.
04:03We're losing 100,000 every year right now from this.
04:07And so I think there will be general support for us taking stronger action.
04:13But I think it should involve Congress once again.
04:16If it's determined, and this is, you know, we're postulating at this point,
04:19but if it is determined that the president, you know, did not have all of the ducks in the row
04:27and that some of these boats had civilians on them that were not running drugs,
04:33what recourse is there?
04:35Is there any recourse at that point?
04:36Well, he would lose all support for this if that happens.
04:40And I think Congress would have to take action in the other direction to prevent or to say we don't support it.
04:46We cut funding for it.
04:48No, he's got to have good intelligence here.
04:51This better be 100% locked and loaded that you've got the right people shipping in here,
04:58whether it's cocaine or fentanyl, whatever it may be.
05:01And he's got to have that right.
05:02You know, we can't afford to have what happened under Joe Biden in the last days of Afghanistan
05:06where they misidentified that terrorist and they hit a family.
05:12That was terrible.
05:13You know, that's been swept under the rug.
05:15It was a terrible mistake.
05:18And it's in people's lives that day.
05:21We can't afford to have that happen here.
05:23Congressman, I really appreciate your time today.
05:24Is there anything else that you'd like to add, a question I didn't ask that you feel like needs to be answered?
05:28It's a complicated question.
05:29And I'm giving you a nuanced answer.
05:31I wish it was just 100% black or white.
05:34You know, I've had to grapple with this.
05:35You know, when I was in combat and I commanded five times, we always have a lawyer.
05:42And I don't believe in just giving stuff to a lawyer and then making a decision.
05:45You come up with a policy thing you want to do.
05:48But then you make sure it's legal, that you're not crossing some kind of line.
05:52And I just think this here is the attorney general and the lawyer has got to study this very carefully and make sure we have it right.
05:58And I'm not a lawyer.
06:00So my gut tells me when you're losing 100,000 people a year, we've got to take action.
06:07For more reporting like this, download the Straight Arrow News app today.
06:10We'll see you next time.
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