Lawmakers see video of second strike on survivors

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have raised questions about the Trump administration's deadly boat strike campaign. And yesterday, they finally

campaign. And yesterday, they finally got some answers. During a briefing with top military officials, a group of congressional leaders viewed unedited footage of that highly scrutinized September 2nd attack for the first time.

That's a so-called double tap strike that killed shipwrecked survivors who were seen clinging to the broken alleged drug boat after the initial impact.

Multiple members described watching the survivors attempt to flip the capsized vessel as they were again attacked. The

top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, that's Congressman Adam Smith of Washington, told MS Now the justification given for the follow-up strike was that drugs could still be under the piece of the boat the survivors were clinging to, leaving

officials concerned the men could continue the mission. Overall, the

lawmakers emerged from that meeting split along party lines. Republicans

largely saying they were content with the explanation provided by Admiral Frank M. Bradley. He's the commander who

Frank M. Bradley. He's the commander who oversaw the attack. Democrats,

meanwhile, saying they only had more to be concerned about. Members from both parties did say that Admiral Bradley told them he had not received an order to quote kill everybody. But then their

accounts seem to differ starkly from there.

I saw two survivors trying to flip a boat loaded with drugs down from the United States back over so they could stay in the fight and potentially given

all the contacts we heard of other naroterist boats in the area coming to their aid to recover their caro and recover those narot terrorists. And just

like you would blow up a boat off of the Somali coast or the Yemeni coast and you'd come back and strike it again if it still had terrorists and it still had explosives or missiles. Admiral Bradley

and Secretary Had did exactly what we would expect them to do.

>> What I saw in that room was one of the most troubling things I've seen in my time in public service. Um you have two individuals in clear distress uh without

any means of uh locomotion with a destroyed vessel um who are killed by the United States. Under the DoD manual uh for abiding by the laws of armed

conflict, the specific example given of an impermissible action is attacking a shipwreck. Any American who sees the

shipwreck. Any American who sees the video that I saw will see the United States military attacking shipwrecked sailors. People will someday see this

sailors. People will someday see this video and they will see that that video shows, if you don't have the broader context, an attack on shipwreck sailors.

Meanwhile, as questions continue to swirl about the legality of the September attack and the administration's anti-cartel campaign as a whole, the US military says it launched another strike yesterday on a

suspected drug smuggling boat in the Eastern Pacific Ocean. US Southern

Command released this short video of the attack announcing that four so-called narot terrorists on board were killed.

Once again, there was no evidence supporting the allegations about the boat or its passengers. Yesterday's

strike marks the 22nd attack by the Trump administration on alleged drug boats in a month'slong operation that has thus far killed nearly 90 people.

Ahead of this announcement, a spokesman for Turning Point USA posted, quote, "Every new attack aimed at Pete Hegsth makes me want another narco drug boat blown up and sent to the bottom of the

ocean." To which the defense secretary

ocean." To which the defense secretary responded, quote, "Your wish is our command, Andrew. Just sunk another narco

command, Andrew. Just sunk another narco boat." a lot for us to get to with MS

boat." a lot for us to get to with MS Now's senior national security reporter David RH. So David, first of all, when

David RH. So David, first of all, when you see that response from Secretary Hegsth there, it's clear that none of the controversies that he's currently embroiled in seem to be uh diminishing

his sass when he talks about this. The

seriousness though was underscored, I think, on Capitol Hill. And it's so striking, I think, a the fact that these members got the same briefing generally, but came out with such starkly different

views of what happened along party lines. And I wonder what you think that

lines. And I wonder what you think that means for any kind of investigation going forward.

>> As always, you're asking exactly the right question. Thank you.

right question. Thank you.

>> No, it's a reflection of our divide and this sort of, you know, these are terrorists and they were a danger to US forces and a danger to the American public and they should be killed is what we essentially heard from, you know,

strongly proTrump Republicans. Then

Democrats essentially say this is a war crime. Um, these are bad people, drug

crime. Um, these are bad people, drug traffickers, but they don't deserve to essentially be executed. And the broader question is this whole effort nearly 90 people now and it's it's also about

presidential power. The president has

presidential power. The president has decided anyone smuggling drugs is in is waging war on the United States.

>> And that's extraordinary. Like the the definition of terrorism has always been to groups that are carrying out terrorist attack, armed attack, bombing, shootings.

>> And so that's what's made this so different. And then it was it was very

different. And then it was it was very stark um to see the difference. There

are four senators though who called out the broader policy and they they specifically questioned the pardon that President Trump granted to the president

of Honduras who allowed hundreds of tons of cocaine to transit Honduras up into Mexico and into the United States. The

four Tom Tillis, >> uh, Bill Cassidy, Todd Young, and Susan Collins, all of them spoke out earlier this week questioning the boat strikes and questioning this whole policy. Also,

several of them are up for re-election in 2026 with the exception of Tom Tillis, who is resigning, not from his post immediately, but not seeking re-election. I think that's an important

re-election. I think that's an important piece of this as well. You know, the other piece that struck me is the way that we heard Adam Smith, the uh and and uh Jim Heimmes, the heads of the Intel

and Armed Services Committee talk about this. They are not usually hyperbolic

this. They are not usually hyperbolic members, especially when they're talking about information that's sensitive like this. The fact that they are using the

this. The fact that they are using the words that we played kind of underscores, I think, the gravity of the way that Democrats will keep the focus here. But do you ultimately think that

here. But do you ultimately think that they get the video released publicly?

The president said, "Yeah, no big deal."

But is it >> it's a very big deal and it's going to come down to votes on the committee.

They can subpoena the video. They can

subpoena all these communications.

>> Um, and that's the question is it just comes back to and and look, these Republicans have been pushing back. I

mean the Epstein the broader Republican push back was Epstein but on Ukraine they've backed the Ukrainians this this group generally speaking and will they sort of aggressively asked for because

if more comes out the video and this is what the Democrats kept saying if the American public sees the video of these two men they claim are essentially hanging on to what's left of a boat.

>> Yeah.

>> They'll be seen as like are these the people that the United States should should kill? I mean, the the the

should kill? I mean, the the the comparison is to the Japanese machine gunning American sailors who were hanging on to wreckage in World War II.

And it is a point of pride for the American military that the United States, US forces do not intentionally kill civilians or people that are not an imminent threat. And you could argue

imminent threat. And you could argue just lastly that none of these there's no threats to American forces. These are

drones.

>> Yeah.

>> All these boats have no weapons that could somehow and even if they could, they're they're shooting at an armed unarmed drone.

>> Yeah. So anyway, the video is key.

>> I think that's really it's important context and the video is key. And also

the fact that they've released video of including what we were just showing on the screen, all of the other strikes except for now this one that is controversial and in question. It really

does, I think, allow Republican lawmakers to do the obvious thing and say, "All right, well, you've released all the other stuff. Why don't you release this?" I think that's just going

release this?" I think that's just going to be added to the pile of questions that lawmakers have specifically for the Defense Secretary Pete Hegsth. Because

there's also the inspector general report about Hexa's use of the signal app to send classified information that just came out and it contradicts his claim of totally being exonerated because the IG's full 84page

unclassified report which was released yesterday found that some of the information HGs sent from his personal cell phone on March 15th matched the operational information that US Central

Command had classified as secret and restricted to American personnel only.

The report concluded that HEGs actions risked harm to military personnel and mission object objectives by transmitting details about the number and timing of air strikes over hostile

territory just hours before they were actually carried out. Investigators

determined that Hegath had transmitted details about the means and timing of strikes, aircraft type, and weapon systems employed, including a message stating, "This is when the first bombs

will definitely drop in all caps."

Pretty obvious. Hegsathth has the authority to declassify materials, but the investigation didn't find any evidence that he exercised it in this case. The inspector general also

case. The inspector general also reported that Hegsath declined to be interviewed and refused to hand over his personal phone to investigators. So, the

lack of cooperation means they still have some gaps here. But what does it tell you that an Inspector General report is clearly identifying that a defense secretary endangered the lives

of military members? and it seems within the administration to be met with a collective shrug, at least right now.

>> If any other member of the military had done something like this, it would be the end of their career. And what's so telling is that he refuses to hand over his phone or sit for an interview because there are other examples of him

sending information over signal that he shouldn't have to family members.

>> And so, and he broke federal law because the the messages on Signal, and we use Signal, you know, were set to autodelete. Well, we use it, but we

autodelete. Well, we use it, but we don't have government preservation.

>> We're not going to get service, you know, in danger. But again, that was like a violation of a federal law about keeping communications, you know, public or keeping a record. They keep them secret. But so they got more

secret. But so they got more information, the inspector general from the Atlantic magazine. It's screenshots

of these messages than they did from the Secretary of Defense, >> which is of course part of the point.

There's a lot of different pieces that make the signal chat concerning, but the idea that anyone could have been added to it, in this case, Jeffrey Goldberg from the Atlantic, I think only lends to

the idea of how careful are people being with what should be very sensitive information. I think this story is going

information. I think this story is going to continue to spread through Washington, but we'll see ultimately what lawmakers do with all the concern that they seem to have at this point. MS

Now, senior national security reporter David RH, as always, thank you. Great to

see you. Thank

see you. Thank