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MANHATTAN (CN) — The American Civil Liberties Union sued on Tuesday to order the production of an Office of Legal Counsel memo concerning the U.S. military’s claimed authority to carry out lethal strikes on civilians in boats the U.S. government claims are shuttling drugs for Latin American cartels.
The boat strikes, which have killed more than eighty civilians since September 2025, have been denounced domestically and internationally as illegal and unethical, while President Donald Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth have both defended the attacks as lawful acts of “armed conflict” with the international drug syndicates.
In its civil complaint filed in the Southern District of New York, the ACLU seeks — under the Freedom of Information Act — the production of a memo from the Department of Justice’s Office Legal Counsel that purports to justify the Caribbean strikes.
“The public deserves to know how our government is justifying the cold-blooded murder of civilians as lawful and why it believes it can hand out get-out-of-jail-free cards to people committing these crimes,” Jeffrey Stein, staff attorney with the ACLU’s National Security Project said in a statement. “The Trump administration must stop these illegal and immoral strikes, and officials who have carried them out must be held accountable.”
The ACLU, joined in the complaint by the Center for Constitutional Rights, contends that disclosure is necessary, citing media reports that the legal office’s opinion purports to immunize personnel who authorized or took part in these unlawful strikes from future criminal prosecution.
“DOJ has adopted these conclusions, publicly stating that ‘[t]he strikes were ordered consistent with the laws of armed conflict, and as such are lawful orders,’ and that ‘[m]ilitary personnel are legally obligated to follow lawful orders and, as such, are not subject to prosecution for following lawful orders,’” the ACLU writes.
The ACLU notes that in mid-November, several members of Congress were permitted to read the opinion.
“Many found its analysis deeply troubling. Indeed, one senator remarked that the opinion ‘would not constrain any use of force anywhere in the world. I mean, it is broad enough to authorize just about anything,’” the ACLU says in the suit.
The plaintiffs also seek disclosure of any unclassified summaries of that opinion, and the release of a July 2025 Presidential Directive to the Department of Defense authorizing the use of military force against Latin America.
“The Trump administration is displacing the fundamental mandates of international law with the phony wartime rhetoric of a basic autocrat,” Baher Azmy, legal director of the Center for Constitutional Rights, said in a statement. “If the OLC opinion seeks to dress up legalese in order to provide cover for the obvious illegality of these serial homicides, the public needs to see this analysis and ultimately hold accountable all those who facilitate murder in the United States’ name.”
The Office of Legal Counsel, the Department of State and the Department of Defense are each named as co-defendants.
Trump has also justified the boat strikes by proclaiming criminal drug trafficking organizations to be unlawful combatants, relying on the same legal authority used by President George W. Bush’s administration for the war on terrorism.
In late October, Trump clarified the U.S. strategy.
“We’re going to kill them,” Trump said at a White House event.
The strikes and an unusually large U.S. military buildup in the Caribbean Sea and the waters off Venezuela, including the deployment of the USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier, have raised speculation that the administration may attempt to topple Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, who faces charges of narcoterrorism in the U.S.
One of the United States’ closest allies, the United Kingdom has paused intelligence flows for counternarcotics missions after the U.S. began using airstrikes to sink small vessels in the Caribbean and Pacific, over concerns over legality and complicity for the strikes.
“The public deserves to know how the Trump administration is rubber-stamping the bombing of civilians in the Caribbean Sea, with no accountability,” Ify Chikezie, staff attorney at the New York Civil Liberties Union, said in a statement. “By claiming that these attacks are legal while refusing to provide any evidence or rationale, Trump shows once again his disdain for basic transparency, human rights, and the rule of law. The courts must step in and order the administration to release these documents immediately.”
Representatives for both the Department of Justice and the Department of Defense declined on Tuesday evening to comment on the FOIA complaint.
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