Speaker A
Hey everybody.
Rachel Maddow discusses illegal military orders, Trump's controversial pardons, and the dubious rationale behind potential conflict with Venezuela.
Key Takeaways
- Military members are legally obligated to disobey illegal orders, but face severe risks when orders come from top leadership.
- Trump’s labeling of disobedience as seditious is historically unprecedented and dangerous.
- The drug trafficking justification for conflict with Venezuela is weak and contradicted by pardons of major drug traffickers.
- Corruption and political lobbying appear to influence presidential pardons and policy decisions.
- The true motives behind U.S. actions toward Venezuela remain unclear and potentially self-serving.
Summary
- Members of Congress and military veterans emphasize the duty to disobey illegal orders under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.
- President Trump labeled this stance as seditious behavior, unprecedentedly threatening severe punishment for sitting members of Congress.
- Military personnel face a difficult position when civilian leadership issues potentially illegal orders, risking charges like war crimes.
- The justification for aggressive actions against Venezuela is framed as combating drug trafficking, specifically fentanyl, despite Venezuela's limited involvement.
- Trump pardoned former Honduran president Juan Hernandez, a convicted drug trafficker, contradicting the stated anti-narcotics rationale.
- No clear rationale has been provided by the White House for potential conflict with Venezuela beyond questionable drug war claims.
- There are suggestions of corruption and lobbying influencing Trump’s pardons, highlighting a money trail.
- Concerns are raised about the true motives behind U.S. actions toward Venezuela, including optics and resource exploitation.
- The discussion questions the consistency of Trump’s 'America First' and anti-war promises in light of these developments.
- The segment underscores the complexity and potential injustice faced by military members caught between illegal orders and civilian commands.
Full Transcript — Download SRT & Markdown
Speaker A
We're back with Rachel Maddow.
Speaker A
Now, uh, uh, a couple uh week ago, 10 days ago, um, several members of Congress, all veterans, put out a video saying, um, just a reminder that the uniform code of military justice says that you not only can uh disobey a illegal order, but that you should disobey a illegal order. That's what that's taught in officer training core.
Speaker B
Yes.
Speaker A
Um, the president's response to that was to call it uh seditious behavior, if I'm paraphrasing here. No, seditious behavior punishable by all caps death. Do you know of any precedent in American history where the president called for the execution of sitting members of Congress?
Speaker B
I do not.
Speaker B
It's not just bad about the Trump administration, it's also a tragedy for members of the military who are being put in in between a rock and a hard place because members of the military will follow the orders of civilian leadership. It's a really important it's a really important part of who we are as a country. But when those orders are illegal, they're put in the position of having to parse what to do and there's no good answer. What the military tells them to do is to not obey illegal orders, but here's the Secretary of Defense and the president effectively saying, well, if I said it, it's not illegal. It just puts it puts Admiral Bradley at the special in special operations, it puts everybody involved in those strikes in a disastrous position where they may be charged with war crimes or with murder for doing something that Donald Trump and and Pete Hegseth told them to do, and that's not fair to our members of the military.
Speaker A
I agree.
Speaker A
I guess the only justifications put forward for all of these boats is that they are uh I think drugs uh generally, full of drugs generally, sometimes specifically labeled uh for Fentanyl, even though Venezuela does not is not really involved in the Fentanyl trade. Um, but at the same time, while this sort of narco-terrorism justification has been put out there, um, convicted drug trafficker and former Honduran president Juan Hernandez was released from prison two day after receiving a pardon from Trump, even though he was found guilty by an American jury, sentenced to something like 45 years in jail, and it was for
Speaker B
Yeah.
Speaker A
aiding in the smuggling of 400 tons of cocaine that he said, and I'm paraphrasing here, we will uh force the powder up the Gringo's nose.
Speaker B
Yes.
Speaker A
And Trump pardoned him.
Speaker A
Is there any obviously that flies in the face of fighting narco-terrorism.
Speaker B
Yeah.
Speaker A
Has the White House put forth any
Speaker B
No.
Speaker A
rationale for this?
Speaker B
Not at all.
Speaker B
I mean, why are we going to go to war with Venezuela?
Speaker A
That's fair.
Speaker B
Anybody?
Speaker A
Also they haven't.
Speaker B
Like has has anybody heard
Speaker A
They haven't put forth any.
Speaker B
They haven't put for the only rationale they've put forth is that we're stopping drug trafficking of Fentanyl, which doesn't come from Venezuela.
Speaker B
Okay.
Speaker B
And if there is a drug trafficking rationale for a war, which is a pretty dubious idea in the first place, since drug trafficking is a crime, so why make it a war? Um, to have just pardoned the most prolific convicted drug smuggler in the history of the United States and set him free, makes absolutely no sense.
Speaker B
And so,
Speaker A
Can you think of why it is? He just doesn't like the idea of a president going to jail for anything?
Speaker B
I know, it's weird.
Speaker A
But I think that's a serious that's a serious question because he doesn't like Jair Bolsonaro. Yeah. You know, they that seems related to me.
Speaker B
I mean, it should be noted that this particular drug um uh drug trafficking former Honduran president did hire a Republican uh lobbying firm a few years ago and paid them a lot of money in order to get him in this kind of position.
Speaker A
Okay.
Speaker B
And so there seems to be a money trail here in terms of the corruption that's behind a lot of Trump's pardons. But for I mean, the bigger question I think for us as Americans is if if it's not drug trafficking, if that's not what's driving what's going on with Venezuela, what is it? And if we really are just going to go start a war with Venezuela for the optics, because they like those videos of blowing up the boats and they think it makes them look tough on TikTok, or because we're going to go steal the oil from that country, which is also a war crime. Um, I think that the whole America first idea, the whole idea that Trump was going to get out us out of stupid wars should maybe be revisited.
Speaker A
We're going to take another break here.
Speaker A
We'll be right back with more Rachel Maddow, everybody.
Topics:Rachel Maddowillegal military ordersUniform Code of Military JusticeTrump pardonsJuan Hernandezdrug traffickingVenezuela conflictwar crimesmilitary ethicsAmerica First
