“I think we’re just going to kill people that are bringing drugs into our country. OK? We’re going to kill them. You know, they’re going to be, like, dead,” President Donald Trump said in late October 2025 of U.S. military strikes on boats in the Caribbean Sea north of Venezuela.
The Trump administration asserted without providing any evidence that the boats were carrying illegal drugs. Fourteen boats that the administration alleged were being operated by drug traffickers have been struck, killing 43 people.
