8 Comments
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Arturo Magidin's avatar

Letters of Marque are the province of Congress alone (just like declaring war). It is listed in Article 1, Section 8: "The Congress shall have Power [...] To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;"

This is not something the Trump administration is supposed to have the power to do.

(Yes, I know... but it is still worthwhile to name the transgressions, damn it)

Lance Khrome's avatar

Well-spotted, and an oversight on the NYT writeup of this disgraceful bit of murder-for-hire. It's as though ANY small craft leaving an Ecuadorean dock gets the drone treatment, and probably with the assent of the Ecuadorean government, a "partner" with the US on its "war on drugs" redux program.

Mary Brownell's avatar

Wow, always good information in the Morning Memo. Letters of Marque! And all the rest--you guys rock.

Susitrav's avatar

I appreciate your work and also the TPM team.

Richard's avatar

War crimes, domestic crimes, wholesale corruption and general malfeasance.

Beachbum's avatar

Noting that Democrats have plenty of young blood coming up - too bad the older folks need to be pushed out instead of doing a handoff that serves all constitutents.

Lance Khrome's avatar

A very depressing slate of MM news this a.m., and the item about ICE goons getting outfitted with essentially Taser gloves takes the biscuit. Spencer Ackerman refers to these "tools" as "The coward's handshake", and I can't top that:

https://www.forever-wars.com/the-cowards-handshake/?ref=forever-wars-newsletter

McLain's avatar

So ICE has stun gloves now. Great.