President Donald Trump blurted out a new detail as he revealed what he saw on video of the alleged boat strike that he lashed out at ABC News White House correspondent Rachel Scott over.
The president and his administration are under fire over the September 2 airstrike that left two survivors who were then killed by a second strike.
On Monday, Trump lashed out at Scott when she correctly noted he had previously pledged to release the video of that second strike, denying he had said so.
In a new interview with Politico White House bureau chief Dasha Burns that dropped Tuesday morning, Trump told Burns what he saw on that video — and that it was “not pretty”:
TRUMP: The Democrats are running some bad ships.BURNS: Speaking of ships, I do want to talk about the boat strikes. The defense secretary, should he testify, Pete Hegseth, under oath before Congress about that controversial second strike on the alleged drug boat on October … on Sept. 2?TRUMP: I don’t care if he does. He can if he wants. I don’t care. You know, let …BURNS: Do you think he should?TRUMP: I don’t care. I would say do it if you want, Pete.BURNS: Have you …TRUMP: He’s doing a great job. Uh …BURNS: Have you watched the video …TRUMP: … he was stopping … uh, I watch everything, yeah. I watch everything. I see a lot of things.
Um …BURNS: And do you believe that that second …TRUMP: … it’s not pretty but … but …BURNS: … strike was necessary?TRUMP: Uh, well, it looked like they were trying to turn back over the boat, but I don’t get involved in that. That’s up to them. Uh, the admiral that did that was … is a highly respected … as you know, a highly respected man. And we save 25,000 people every time we knock out a boat. On average, they kill 25,000 Americans so you know, I don’t like doing that, but the, uh, the drugs coming in through the sea are down to … they’re down by 92 percent. And I’m trying to figure out the 8 percent, who are they? Nobody wants to drive boats to America loaded up with drugs anymore.BURNS: Well, I do want to ask because …TRUMP: And we’re gonna hit ’em on land very soon, too.
Watch above via Politico — the full interview is here.