Closing summary
This concludes our live coverage of the second Trump administration for the day. Here are the latest developments:
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White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed that US forces launched a second strike on a suspected drug-trafficking vessel on 2 September, but described it as legal “self-defense to protect Americans”.
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Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary who ordered the attack, distanced himself from the commander who carried out the second strike, suggesting that the Pentagon supported the commander, but that he had made the decision to kill shipwreck survivors, which is a war crime.
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Hegseth previously told his former colleague at Fox & Friends he had monitored the attack in real time. “I watched it live,” Hegseth said the morning after the strikes.
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US Navy vice admiral Frank Bradley, who was the commander in charge of the attack, will provide a classified briefing to lawmakers on Thursday.
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A federal appeals court ruled today that Trump’s former personal lawyer, Alina Habba, is serving unlawfully as the US attorney for the district of New Jersey.
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The US homeland security secretary, Kristi Noem, was criticized on Monday for using language on social media that closely echoes dehumanizing terms for immigrants deployed by neo-Nazis and white supremacists.
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The Canadian publisher of the Franklin the Turtle books, a series for children, has condemned the “unauthorized” use of the beloved character’s image by the US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth.
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Mark Kelly, the Democratic senator from Arizona, said that Trump’s accusation that he is guilty of Seditious behavior, punishable by death” has led to a new wave of threats against him and his wife, Gabby Giffords, a former congresswoman who survived an assassination attempt in 2011.
Key events
Commander who ordered second strike in Septmber attack on suspected drug traffickers to brief Congress
US Navy vice admiral Frank Bradley will provide a classified briefing to lawmakers overseeing the military on Thursday as they investigate a US military attack on a boat allegedly carrying drugs that included a second strike that killed two survivors.
Bradley, who was commander of Joint Special Operations Command at the time of the 2 September attack, ordered the follow-up strike, the White House said Monday as it defended the defense secretary, Pete Hegseth from accusations that he had ordered a war crime.
Mike Rogers, the Republican chair of the House Armed Services Committee, said he was “satisfied” following a conversation with Hegseth on the attack, but that he also wanted to hear from Bradley.
“We’ll all have clarity on Thursday afternoon,” Rogers said.
‘I watched it live’, Hegseth told Fox the day after September strike where shipwreck survivors were killed
Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary, suggested on Monday that he did not give a direct command to have two survivors of a strike on a suspected drug-smuggling boat killed in a follow-up attack.
But the morning after the attack, of 3 September, Hegseth told his former colleagues on the morning show Fox & Friends that he had monitored the operation in real time.
“I can tell you that was definitely not artificial intelligence: I watched it live,” Hegseth said.
On Sunday, Donald Trump told reporters that Hegseth had told him that he did not order a second strike to kill “the two men”.
“He said he did not say that, and I believe him,” Trump said, referring to a verbal order from Hegseth to conduct a second strike once the survivors were spotted. “He said he didn’t do it, he said he never said it.”
Kristi Noem criticized for using language ‘virtually indistinguishable’ from neo-Nazis to support Trump’s new travel ban
The US homeland security secretary, Kristi Noem, was criticized on Monday for using language on social media that closely echoes dehumanizing terms for immigrants deployed by neo-Nazis and white supremacists.
“I just met with the President,” Noem wrote on her official government X account on Monday.
“I am recommending a full travel ban on every damn country that’s been flooding our nation with killers, leeches, and entitlement junkies,” she added.
“This language is virtually indistinguishable from what you’d find on Stormfront,” Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a lawyer and senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, responded, making reference to a neo-Nazi internet forum.
Noem’s post went on to describe immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers as “foreign invaders” who aim “to slaughter our heroes, suck dry our hard-earned tax dollars, or snatch the benefits owed to AMERICANS.”
The homeland security secretary contrasted those hoping to find refuge in the United States today with “Our forefathers” who “built this nation”. She did not address the fact that the European colonists who founded the country were themselves foreign invaders who drove out the native population and settled on stolen land.
In June, Donald Trump signed a proclamation to implement a new travel ban that fully or partially “restricted the entry of foreign nationals” from 19 countries: Afghanistan, Burma, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen, Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela.
Publisher of Franklin the Turtle books condemns Hegseth’s ‘denigrating, violent’ use of beloved character’s image
The Canadian publisher of the Franklin the Turtle books, a series for children, has condemned the “unauthorized” use of the beloved character’s image by the US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth.
In a social media post on Sunday, Hegseth made light of a series of deadly US strikes on the boats of suspected drug smugglers off Venezuela by posting the mock cover of a new entry in the series: “Franklin Targets Narco Terrorists”, with an image of the turtle, wearing a US military uniform, firing a rocket-propelled grenade at armed drug runners.
“Franklin the Turtle is a beloved Canadian icon who has inspired generations of children and stands for kindness, empathy, and inclusivity,” the publisher Kids Can Press said in a statement. “We strongly condemn any denigrating, violent, or unauthorized use of Franklin’s name or image, which directly contradicts these values.”
The Canadian author of all 30 books in the Franklin series, Paulette Bourgeois, is a former journalist who worked as a freelance writer in Washington DC before coming up with the idea for the character while watching an episode of the sit-com M*A*S*H.
Senate plans confirmation vote for Jared Isaacman, Trump’s off-again, on-again nominee to lead NASA
The US Senate plans to vote next week on the on-again, off-again, on-again nomination of Jared Isaacman, a private astronaut and ally of Elon Musk, for the post of Nasa administrator.
Ted Cruz, the chairman of the Senate committee on commerce, science and transportation announced on Monday that the confirmation vote is now scheduled for next Monday, 8 December.
Isaacman’s nomination was previously pulled by Donald Trump in May, just days after Musk’s official departure from the White House, where the SpaceX CEO had burned bridges during his term as a “special government employee” overseeing the wholesale destruction of government agencies.
Without explanation, Trump reversed course last month and renominated Isaacman, after letting Nasa languish for months with Sean Duffy, the secretary of transportation, serving in a dual role as acting Nasa administrator.
Isaacman’s confirmation hearing is scheduled for this Wednesday.
He has the support of dozens of former Nasa astronauts who sent a letter to the committee calling for his confirmation last week. One of the signatories is Scott Kelly, whose identical twin brother Mark is the Democratic senator from Arizona under attack by Trump.
Hegseth seems to distance himself from admiral who ordered strike to kill survivors of suspected drug boat
Pete Hegseth, the US defense secretary, seemed to distance himself on Monday from the commander who ordered a second strike on a suspected drug boat in the Caribbean in September in order to kill survivors of a first strike.
Hegseth, who ordered a lethal strike on the boat, pledged his support for the commander in a social media post which cast the decision as one made by the commander, not him.
“Let’s make one thing crystal clear: Admiral Mitch Bradley is an American hero, a true professional, and has my 100% support. I stand by him and the combat decisions he has made — on the September 2 mission and all others since. America is fortunate to have such men protecting us,” Hegseth wrote on the social media platform X.
When the Department of War “says we have the back of our warriors — we mean it,” Hegseth added, even as he appeared to put all the responsibility on the special operations commander.
As Ryan Goodman, a former defense department lawyer, explains, if an order was issued to kill survivors of a shipwreck, that is a textbook violation of the laws of war, as established in 1945 when a Nazi U-boat commander was found guilty and sentenced to death by a British military court in occupied postwar Germany.
Mark Kelly blames Trump for new wave of threats to his wife, Gabby Giffords, victim of 2011 attack
Speaking at a news conference in Washington on Monday, Mark Kelly, the Democratic senator from Arizona, said that Donald Trump’s accusation that he is guilty of Seditious behavior, punishable by death”, for reminding soldiers in a social media video that they can refuse illegal orders, has led to a new wave of threats against him and his wife, Gabby Giffords, a former congresswoman who survived an assassination attempt in 2011.
“My family knows the cost of political violence. My wife Gabby was shot in the head and nearly died while speaking with her constituents. The president should understand this too; he has been the target of political violence himself”, Kelly said.
“Gabby and I are no strangers to political violence. We get a lot of threats already,” Kelly added. “She gets threats on her life, more so today because of what Donald Trump said about me 10 days ago: that I should be hanged, that I should be executed,” Kelly said.
Kelly told reporters that “threatening calls that we get into our office have skyrocketed, and they were very graphic”.
The senator added that the president “thinks he can shut me up,” but the intimidation would not work. “I have First Amendment rights, I’m a US senator, I’m doing my job,” Kelly said. “He ain’t gonna shut me up. I mean, he intimidates other people. I’m not intimidated by Donald Trump or Pete Hegseth or anyone else.”
“We’ve become so accustomed to Donald Trump’s behavior that it is worth emphasizing: The president of the United States said that two US senators and four members of the House should be arrested, hanged, and executed for something that is true,” Kelly also said, referring to Trump’s call for all six Democrats with service backgrounds who took part in the video reminding active-duty troops and intelligence officers that they can refuse unlawful orders.
The video was recorded after lawmakers were made aware that at least one strike on suspected drug trafficking boats in the Caribbean had been carried out to kill survivors, which is a textbook violation of the laws of war.
In his prepared remarks, Kelly contrasted his own biography with that of the president, saying:
In 1991, when Donald Trump was driving the Taj Mahal casino into bankruptcy, I was getting shot at over Iraq and Kuwait. In 2001, after Donald Trump said that the collapse of the Twin Towers now meant he now owned the tallest skyscraper in Manhattan, I was carrying flags honoring 9/11 victims into space on a rocket ship.
In 2003, when Donald Trump was writing birthday greetings to the monster, Jeffrey Epstein, I was the first on the scene to recover the bodies of my fellow astronauts who died when Space Shuttle Columbia exploded during re-entry.
In 2011, when Trump was hosting a reality show, and peddling conspiracy theories against president Barack Obama, I was sitting next to my wife’s hospital bed as she recovered from a gunshot wound to the head.
I’ve been through a lot worse in service to my country; the president and Pete Hegseth are not going to silence me.
“If Donald Trump continues his actions against Venezuela, we will immediately file a War Powers Resolution to block the deployment of U.S. forces to Venezuela,” the senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer wrote on social media on Monday. “The power to declare war lies solely in the hands of Congress—not Donald Trump.”
Trump holds talks with advisers on Venezuela – report
Donald Trump held talks on Monday with top advisers to discuss the pressure campaign on Venezuela, among other topics, a senior US official told Reuters.
The official said the Oval Office meeting included senior members of Trump’s national security team. No details of the talks were immediately available.
The session came as Trump ratchets up pressure on Venezuela over what the US says are drug shipments emanating from that country that threaten the lives of Americans.
While the Trump administration has accused Venezuela’s authoritarian president, Nicolás Maduro, of being a “narco-terrorist” kingpin, the president has pledged to pardon a former Honduran president, Juan Orlando Hernández, sentenced last year to 45 years in US federal prison for allegedly creating “a cocaine superhighway to the United States”.
Despite those mixed messages, the Trump administration has been weighing Venezuela-related options to combat what it has portrayed as Maduro’s role in supplying illegal drugs that have killed Americans. Maduro has denied having any links to the illegal drug trade and accused the US of plotting to steal Venezuela’s vast oil reserves.
On Saturday, Trump said the airspace above and surrounding Venezuela should be considered “closed in its entirety,” but gave no further details, stirring anxiety and confusion in Caracas.
Trump confirmed on Sunday that he had spoken to Maduro, whom the US considers an illegitimate leader after an election the opposition called fraudulent, but Trump declined to provide details of the conversation when asked about it on Air Force One on Sunday.
US forces in the region have been described as focused on counter-narcotics operations, even though the assembled firepower far outweighs what is necessary for them. The US military has carried out at least 21 strikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean and Pacific since September, killing at least 83 people.
Reports of looming action have proliferated in recent weeks as the US military has deployed forces to the Caribbean amid worsening relations with Venezuela.
Roger Wicker, the Mississippi Republican who leads the Senate Armed Services Committee, told CNN on Monday that he intends to get all of the video and audio recorded by the Pentagon during strikes on a suspected drug smuggling boat off Venezuela in September to determine if a second strike was carried out to kill survivors, as the Washington Post reported on Friday.
“I’ve spoken to the secretary of defense and we’ll be speaking to the admiral that was in charge of the operation,” Wicker said. “The secretary did indicate, which has now been in the news media, that there was a second attack.”
Asked if there were survivors of the first strike, Wicker responded: “I don’t have that information… but I do think we’ll get that information. And we’re certainly going to have available to us all of the audio and all of the video”.
Treasury secretary announces investigation of rightwing activist’s allegation that federal funds were diverted to Somali militants
The US treasury department is investigating allegations from a rightwing activist that federal funds were fraudulently diverted from Minnesota to benefit al-Shabaab, an Islamist militant group in Somalia.
The investigation was announced on social media by Scott Bessent, the treasury secretary, in response to an investigation by the activist and writer Christopher Rufo, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute who previously devised the campaign against critical race theory.
Bessent announced the investigation in a deeply partisan message that thanked Donald Trump, who has asserted without evidence that Somali Americans were “ripping us off”, and blamed the possible fraud on what the secretary called “the feckless mismanagement of the Biden Administration and Governor Tim Walz”.
Former US ambassador to Russia asks why Jared Kushner is going to Moscow for talks with Putin but not Marco Rubio
A Wall Street Journal report that Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who holds no government role, is flying to Moscow with the president’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, for talks with the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, instead of the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, left a former US ambassador to Russia, Michael McFaul, puzzled.
“Can someone explain to me why Special Envoy Witkoff and the presidents son-in-law participate in negotiations with both the Ukrainians and Russians, but our Secretary of State only talks to the Ukrainians and is not leading the delegation to talk to Putin?” McFaul, who was as Barack Obama’s ambassador in Moscow from 2012 to 2014, asked on social media. “I don’t get it.”
As McFaul pointed out, Rubio, who is both Trump’s secretary of state and national security adviser, was at the literal center of talks with Ukraine’s negotiators in Florida on Sunday, seated between Witkoff and Kushner.
While the apparent sidelining of Rubio in this diplomatic effort mirrors the central role played by Witkoff and Kushner in brokering a ceasefire in Gaza, there is one practical consideration that could explain the absence of the secretary of state from the flight to Moscow. Rubio has been banned from entering Russian territory since last year when his name, and that of his wife, was added to a list of US citizens subject to personal sanctions by the Russian government, apparently over his support for Ukraine after the full-scale Russian invasion in 2022.
“The ban applies to those involved in conceiving, carrying out and justifying the anti-Russia policy adopted by the current administration of the United States, as well as those directly involved in anti-Russia undertakings,” the Kremlin explained in 2024 when an earlier slate of Americans was “permanently banned” from entering Russia. “The decision is part of retaliatory measures in response to the massive and constantly expanding list of sanctions imposed by the American government on Russian citizens for supporting the Kremlin and the special military operation.”
McFaul is also on the list of Americans barred from Russia, as are more than 2,000 journalists, actors, officials and lawmakers, including then senator JD Vance and the late John McCain, who was just one of several US officials whose right to visit Russia was taken away after they were already dead.
In a number of places, the list of Americans banned from Russia by the Kremlin overlaps with Donald Trump’s personal enemies list. Those barred from ever visiting Russia include: Barack Obama, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Elizabeth Warren, Seth Meyers, Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel, Rachel Maddow, John Bolton, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Mark Kelly, Janet Mills and even the Georgia secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, who famously refused Trump’s plea to “find” him the exact number of votes he needed to overturn his loss to Joe Biden in the state’s 2020 election.
