JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
Democrat Jack Reed, ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, launched the bipartisan Senate investigation into the strike off the coast of Venezuela. Admiral Frank Bradley, who leads U.S. Special Operations Command, recently briefed leadership behind closed doors. Senator Reed, welcome back to the program.
JACK REED: Thank you very much.
SUMMERS: Thanks for being here. So after a separate briefing today, Democratic Congressman Jim Himes called video that he saw of this episode "deeply, deeply troubling." I'm quoting here. Did your committee also see that video?
REED: We did see the video, and it was disturbing. As I said last night in a speech on the floor of the Senate, I believe the administration should release the entire video, what we saw, and also release numerous other reports so that there can be a factual discussion of what happened. Did it follow the law? Was it necessary and effective? All those questions have to be answered. And as I said last evening, the best way to start is to get the information to the public.
SUMMERS: Understanding that this briefing was classified, is there anything else you can tell us about what you learned from Admiral Bradley?
REED: Not really because, again, we asked a series of questions. We were, I think, all of us, including my two colleagues in the House, Mike Rogers and Adam Smith and my chairman Roger Wicker, were all deeply engaged in questioning. We probed as much as we could. And so much of it turns on legal opinions and legal judgments together with, you know, the facts of the situation on the ground. It was, I think, the beginning, I hope, of a fruitful discussion. I don't think we've reached a conclusion yet.
SUMMERS: What questions do you still have after hearing from Admiral Bradley?
REED: Well, the question I have is, to what extent the secretary of defense influenced the operation and that influence contributed to the outcome. Again, Secretary Hegseth was not shy about proclaiming, after the fact, publicly, that we had destroyed a vessel containing cocaine and killing all personnel aboard the vessel. That should be probed, I think, to determine whether that was to - overrode any other conditions or legal requirements.
SUMMERS: Did you get a sense from Admiral Bradley's testimony whether Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth did give that kill-them-all order? Did that come up?
REED: Well, again, that's a detail I think would be inappropriate because of the nature of the hearing.
SUMMERS: I mean, I used to cover defense committees on Capitol Hill, and I know that the Armed Services committees, they have a long history of bipartisanship. But that said, your Republican colleagues are facing a lot of pressure from President Trump in general. And specifically, he has been supportive of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in these actions. How confident are you, Senator, that your committee will be able to investigate thoroughly and that its conclusions will be taken seriously?
REED: Well, I must commend Senator Wicker. We both asked for the hearing. We both have asked for all the materials that are still not being provided. We've tried to be collaborative, and we had. And he's, as you point out, under more pressure than most people in terms of raising these questions. And I think Chairman Rogers in the House and Adam Smith are both very committed, and they see their obligation to the country and also to the men and women of the armed services. I mean, one of the problems we have here is, if we don't insist upon strict observation of the rules of law, we can't expect our opponents to do it. And as a result, we're jeopardizing...
SUMMERS: Right.
REED: ...The lives of young men and women in our armed services. And that has to be foremost in our deliberations.
SUMMERS: You have now heard from the admiral. You yourself graduated from West Point. You served as an Army Ranger. Where do you stand, taking stock of all of this? Was this strike a legal military operation?
REED: Well, I have serious questions about the legality of all the strikes. The president has created a whole term of art (ph), a terrorist denominator organization, et cetera, and that has no legislative standing. He is using the military in what has been a traditional law enforcement operation. The Coast Guard, which is a law enforcement agency, has conducted interdiction in the Caribbean for years and years and years. That's the proper way to do it. This is a departure from what has been traditionally seen as the best way to interdict narcotics coming into the United States. And so I have serious serious questions about the overall legal validity of the operation and also individual operations, individual strikes.
SUMMERS: And Senator, I do want to ask you quickly, Secretary Hegseth has also been under scrutiny for sharing sensitive military operation over the free messaging app Signal. And I'll note that NPR CEO Katherine Maher chairs the Signal Foundation Board. The Pentagon's inspector general concluded that the secretary violated Pentagon policies. Some of your Republican colleagues acknowledged that sharing classified information on this app was a problem. Will you call for Hegseth to be dismissed?
REED: Well, I opposed his nomination, so I think I was a little bit ahead of my...
SUMMERS: And I understand that, but he was confirmed. So what should happen now?
REED: Well, these are very serious charges. I don't think they're being treated by the administration as serious as they are. One of the conclusions in the report was that he jeopardized the life and safety of American pilots going into combat action. That's something that no secretary of defense should do. So I think he has made a series of miscues that confirm my original judgment that he lacks the temperament, the experience and the character to be secretary of defense.
SUMMERS: Senator Jack Reed, Democrat from Rhode Island and ranking member on the Armed Services Committee, thanks for your time.
REED: Thank you very much.
SUMMERS: I'll note that in response to the IG report on the use of Signal, the White House has said no classified information was leaked and operational security was not compromised. And Secretary Hegseth has denied a Washington Post report that said he gave orders to kill everybody on the vessel that the U.S. bombed in the Caribbean in early September. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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