When there’s a hot-button national issue, it can be instructive to get some in-House opinions on the matter.
As in United States House of Representatives.
Southern California is big and diverse; so are our members of Congress. They have opinions across the political spectrum. So last week we asked 11 local representatives the same question: “Does President Trump have the authority without congressional approval to carry out strikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean and Pacific? Do you think it’s just to kill alleged drug runners without a trial?”
We gave them a deadline of this week, and many of them even met it, and some of those had interesting things to say.
Only the office of Democrat Luz Rivas in the 29th Congressional District in the San Fernando Valley entirely blew off the chance to air her views to her constituents.
Truthfully, Rep. George Whitesides, D-Santa Clarita, might as well have not replied: “As a member of the House Armed Services Committee, I take my oversight responsibility very seriously and will make a determination after receiving a full briefing on the details of the strikes.”
Rep. Derek Tran, D-45th District, also on the Armed Services Committee, gives the same non-answer. “As a member of the House Armed Services Committee, I take my oversight responsibilities of U.S. military activity seriously. I will continue to review relevant intelligence and perform my duty as a Congressman to check and balance the administration,” he said.
One Republican had zero opinions as well: “We decided to hold off. You can mark us down as no comment,” says the office of Jay Obernolte of the High Desert’s 23rd District.
All the others we asked were forthright in their answers.
Rep. Ted Lieu, a Democrat from the South Bay, answered: “The Trump administration’s military strikes on boats allegedly carrying drugs appear to violate the Law of Armed Conflict. However, because House Republicans are still on vacation in the middle of a government shutdown, we have had no oversight hearings or briefings and really have no frickin’ idea of important relevant details of these strikes to make a concrete determination of whether they are unlawful.”
Oversight hearings or not, GOP Rep. Young Kim from the 40th District argues the president is keeping Americans safe. “The president has authority to take limited actions to protect the national security of the United States,” she said. “President Trump has rightfully designated certain drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations, and his actions to secure our border have saved countless American lives.”
Echoing this was Republican Rep. Ken Calvert of Riverside County’s 41st District. “In the past five years, nearly half a million Americans have been killed by drugs imported into America by international drug cartels,” she said. “That is why I support the administrations’ ongoing efforts to eliminate and reduce the cartels’ capability to force this deadly poison into our communities.”
Democratic Rep. Mark Takano, also in Riverside County, counters the president needs congressional approval for his actions: “Does President Trump have the authority without congressional approval to carry out strikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean and Pacific? No. President Trump is carrying out an illegal war that Congress never authorized.”
Democratic Rep. Norma Torres disputes whether the strikes are actually helping, “True leadership means working with our allies to dismantle criminal networks through lawful means, not taking reckless, ineffective actions that endanger lives and do little to stop drug shipments to the United States.”
Orange County Democratic Rep. Dave Min argues, “Once again, Donald Trump is violating the law to try to look like he’s tough on crime. But as we have seen over and over with this administration, we cannot simply trust them when they claim someone is a criminal or a drug smuggler. That is precisely why we require the government to prove its claims in court before punishing someone.”
And finally, Rep. Laura Friedman from the Burbank area gets to a more fundamental point: “Smuggling drugs into the United States is a vile crime that has had massive impacts on our communities, but it is not punishable by death without trial.”
For full answers click here.
