A majority of Americans are opposed to the extrajudicial killing of suspected drug traffickers in Latin America, polling data has shown.
For months, the government has been conducting lethal strikes on boats in the Caribbean and the East Pacific Ocean, which they say are being used to transport narcotics to the U.S. At least 80 people have been killed in the strikes so far, which have taken place without congressional approval.
Earlier this month, Pete Hegseth formally announced the rollout of “Operation Southern Spear,” the government’s anti-cartel campaign, with a vow to “remove narco-terrorists from our hemisphere” and “shield our homeland from the drugs that are killing our people.”
But an IPSOS/Reuters poll has revealed that just 29 percent of voters approve of the government’s extrajudicial murders, with 51 percent saying they were opposed to executing suspected criminals without a trial.
Approval of the strikes has once again been split sharply down party lines, with 58 percent of Republicans supporting the strikes compared to just 8 percent of Democrats. 27 percent of GOP voters said they were against the killings, contrasted with 76 percent of Dems.
Both human rights groups and experts in international law have condemned the government’s extrajudicial killings as illegal, and the governments of both Venezuela and Colombia have accused the U.S. of murdering their citizens.
But the White House defended the killings by claiming to be engaged in “armed conflict” against the drug cartels, using the same legal justification as the Bush administration did to authorize the “War on Terror” following the 9/11 attacks.
The operation has been accompanied by a substantial military buildup near Venezuela, including the deployment of the USS Gerald R. Ford, the world’s largest warship, along with eight additional vessels, advanced aircraft, and thousands of personnel.
“My advice to foreign terrorist organizations is do not get in a boat,” Hegseth said on Wednesday. “If you’re trafficking drugs to poison the American people, and we know you’re from a designated terrorist organization, you’re a foreign terrorist or trafficker—we will find you and we will kill you.”
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has claimed the military buildup is part of a plot to oust him by the U.S. government, after Trump himself admitted last month to authorizing the CIA to conduct covert operations in the country and warned Maduro his days are “numbered.”
However, just 21 percent of Americans said they were in favor of the government using military action to depose Maduro, with 31 percent saying they would prefer to see him deposed by other means.
“All of these decisive strikes have been against designated narcoterrorists bringing deadly poison to our shores, and the president will continue to use every element of American power to stop drugs from flooding into our country and to bring those responsible to justice,” White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said in a statement.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House and Pentagon for further comment.
