Adm. Frank Mitchell Bradley, the U.S. Special Operations commander at the center of a growing firestorm over lethal strikes on Venezuelan boats, is scheduled to brief members of Congress in a closed session on Thursday, according to multiple reports.
Lawmakers on both the House and Senate Armed Services Committees are seeking detailed answers about a Sept. 2 operation in the Caribbean, in which U.S. forces first disabled a suspected Venezuelan drug-smuggling vessel — then carried out a second strike that reportedly killed survivors in the water.
Despite War Secretary Pete Hegseth dismissing initial reports as “fake news,” the White House now says that Bradley approved the follow-up strike and is now defending the mission as lawful self-defense against narco-terrorists tied to the Tren de Aragua cartel, which the Trump administration has designated a foreign terrorist organization.
But legal experts and some lawmakers in both parties say the second strike may have violated international law protections for shipwrecked or incapacitated combatants, raising the possibility that U.S. personnel could face war crimes scrutiny.
Brian Finucane, a former State Department attorney now serving as a senior adviser at the International Crisis Group, is forcefully challenging the administration’s legal justification for using military force — rather than law enforcement tools — against drug cartels. He argues that the United States is not actually engaged in an armed conflict with these groups despite the government’s claim of a “non-international armed conflict.” Without a legitimate war footing, Finucane said, any deliberate killing would constitute murder — and U.S. service members who took part could face criminal charges in American courts.
Other experts have raised similar alarms. Fox News’ Andrew McCarthy noted that even if the United States were operating within a recognized armed conflict, the law still prohibits killing individuals who no longer pose a threat. Doing so would amount to a war crime. He and others pointed to long-established laws of armed conflict that bar “no quarter” orders — directives to leave no survivors — and emphasized that attacking the crew of a disabled enemy vessel is illegal unless the individuals remain actively engaged in combat.
The allegations have prompted both the House and Senate Armed Services Committees to open formal inquiries into what happened and whether U.S. laws governing the use of military force were violated.
Thursday’s briefing comes amid broader concern on Capitol Hill about the administration’s expanded campaign of airstrikes on alleged drug-trafficking boats in Caribbean and Pacific waters, which has killed more than 80 people since September and was undertaken without explicit congressional authorization.
As The Hill reports:
Bradley, who was head of the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) at the time of the strike, will brief the chairmen and ranking members of the Senate and House Armed Services panels on that and other incidents, according to a source familiar with the matter.
The Washington Post reported that Bradley directed a second strike to comply with Hegseth’s order that no one be left alive.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) told reporters Tuesday that senators are looking for more information about the incident.
Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.), who also serves on the committee, offered a different view. Speaking to reporters, he argued that the strikes on Venezuelan vessels fall well within the authority granted to President Trump as commander in chief, signaling that he sees no legal overreach in the operation.
“President Trump is clearly within his Article II powers,” he said. “The fact is, they’re taking out narco-terrorist boats. That’s the truth. So, to try to spin this into something else, this is just the constant churning that all the Democrats have. They don’t have a message.”
However, criticism of the administration’s strategy has intensified this week following Trump’s decision to pardon former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández — convicted in 2024 of facilitating massive cocaine trafficking to the United States — after dismissing the case as a “Biden set up.”
Although Hernández was convicted in 2024, the investigation began in 2016 during Trump’s first term, leading to his extradition in 2022 and a 45-year prison sentence. The Dec. 2, 2025, pardon freed him outright, prompting backlash from national security officials who warned it could undermine international anti-narcotics cooperation.
One detail drawing renewed attention: Emil Bove — the prosecutor who helped put Hernández behind bars — is now a Trump-appointed federal judge. Bove, a former SDNY prosecutor, led the investigation and secured Hernández’s March 2024 conviction before joining the federal bench earlier this year.
It’s still unclear whether Adm. Bradley’s decision will spark political blowback for Secretary Hegseth — but it lands at a moment when scrutiny is already intensifying.
For Hegseth, the question is whether this briefing will be seen as a routine procedural update or as an opening for critics to escalate their pressure. Either way, the spotlight has grown brighter.
This is a breaking news story. Please check back for updates.
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The left is fond of lecturing us to do this or that thing “if it saves one life”. So every time I see one of these drug-running boats go up in smoke I think about the hundreds of American lives being saved, and any compunctions I might have felt go up in smoke along with the vessel.