Van Hollen: 'Very possible there was a war crime committed' in Venezuela boat strike

Source: ABC News

November 30, 2025, 12:21 PM


Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., said Sunday he believes "it's very possible there was a war crime committed" in the administration's first strike against an alleged drug trafficking boat in the Caribbean Sea in September.

"I think it's very possible there was a war crime committed. Of course, for it to be a war crime, you have to accept the Trump administration's whole construct here ... which is we're in armed conflict, at war with this particular -- with the drug gangs. Of course, they've never presented the public with the information they've got here," Van Hollen said on ABC News' "This Week." "If that theory is wrong, then it's plain murder."

Van Hollen, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was responding to a story from The Washington Post that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had reportedly given a spoken order ahead of that Sept. 2 operation for the military to kill everybody aboard the suspected drug boat. After an initial strike left two survivors, the commander leading the operation reportedly complied with Hegseth's alleged directive by ordering a second strike, according to the report.

Hegseth defended the U.S. military's operations targeting the boats in the wake of the Post report, which ABC News has not confirmed the details of.

Read more: https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/white-house-sending-mixed-signals-bacon-russia-ukraine/story?id=127977514