“If the OLC opinion authorizing strikes on cartels is as broad as it seems, it would mean DOJ has interpreted the president to have such extraordinary powers that he alone can decide to prosecute a war far broader than what Congress authorized after the attacks on 9/11,” said Sarah Harrison, a former associate general counsel at the Defense Department who now works as a senior analyst at the Crisis Group. The Defense Department’s memo to lawmakers last week outlining the legal basis for a series of strikes against boats in the Caribbean — which argued that the US is in an “armed conflict” with the cartels, and said the president has determined that smugglers for the cartels are “unlawful combatants”— leaned heavily on the OLC opinion, sources said. “Senator, the Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel opinion was derived through an interagency lawyers working group with the CIA, the State Department, White House counsel, Department of Justice, Department of Defense general counsel, chairman’s legal uniformed judge advocates were part of that decision, and the Office of Legal Counsel has issued an opinion on that, ma’am,” Young told the Senate Armed Services Committee in response to a question from Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen.
Author: Natasha Bertrand, Zachary Cohen
Published at: 2025-10-06 21:20:05
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