Former President Donald Trump recently did an interview with Breitbart News where he revealed that he is in full support of a proposal from Florida Republican Congressman Michael Waltz and Dan Crenshaw that would authorize the use of military force against Mexican drug cartels in order to target their criminal enterprises and destroy them.
Trump said, “I would do that,” when he was asked about the Authorization of the Use of Military Force bill that the two congressmen have proposed.
“Trump had earlier this year released a policy video in which he explained he supported using the military to target the cartels, but this is the first time he has weighed in on the specific proposal before Congress to do so. In response to Waltz’s AUMF plan, Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador has said he opposes it and even threatened to interfere in U.S. elections to help Democrats and oppose Republicans in response to it,” Breitbart said.
NEW VIDEO: President Donald J. Trump Announces Plan to Destroy the Drug Cartels pic.twitter.com/ivh4XZpKFi
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) January 5, 2023
“In addition to being irresponsible, it is an offense to the people of Mexico,” Lopez Obrador went on to say back in March.
Trump, during the exclusive interview with the outlet that was conducted after his speech at the National Rifle Association’s annual gathering, pointed out that he actually does have a good relationship with Obrador. In fact, the former president referred to Obrador as a “gentleman,” despite the fact he’s a socialist and went on to argue that if he were to be reelected to the Oval Office, he firmly believes that he would be able to work with him to crush the cartels with the use of U.S. military assets to provide assistance.
“I also have a very good relationship with the president of Mexico,” Trump said to Breitbart News. “He’s a socialist but he also happens to be a gentleman. You can’t have everything, right? But he’s a great person. Certainly, I would deal with him. This is an invasion of our country — this isn’t just people walking over. This is an invasion. Many of these are people we do not want in our country. They’re very bad for our country. They’re very bad and dangerous. But this is an invasion of our country. Nope, we will stop it and we will stop it immediately.”
“Trump is right that he and Lopez Obrador had a decent working relationship when he was president. In fact, that relationship was the foundation for one of Trump’s most consequential policies, the Remain-in-Mexico plan, which had asylum seekers stay on the other side of the border while their claims were processed rather than being released into the United States as current Democrat President Joe Biden is doing by the millions,” Breitbart added.
During an interview last month at the House GOP conference retreat held in Orlando, Rep. Waltz spoke with Breitbart and stated that his new bill would open up the use of military resources such as space and cyber assets.
“It essentially authorizes military resources,” Waltz explained. “So, space assets for targeting. Your Border Patrol — our law enforcement and border entities don’t have their own space assets. The military does. Offensive cyber — as opposed to just defending our networks here at home, but actually getting inside somebody else’s networks and start disrupting their money, their logistics, their ability to communicate. That all sits inside the Defense Department. So, this would authorize the use — this would authorize the use of military force, but I think it’s more accurate to call it resources.”
Waltz then added that there could be a few limited U.S. special forces strikes against cartel leadership in the proposal, but it would not be an invasion of Mexico.
“We’re not talking about an invasion of Mexico. That’s just a bunch of nonsense,” Waltz said, going on to add, “Could we be talking about very selective special operations targeting of key personnel or kill/capture? Yes, absolutely. Again, we got to begin thinking about them differently. In the 90s, we were running around the world trying to arrest Al Qaeda. After 9/11, we were killing or capturing Al Qaeda. So that is the mindset and that is the actual authorization from Congress we’re trying to get passed for the administration.”
"*" indicates required fields
