Hamadeh Voices Approval for Trump's Directive of Military Force Against the Cartels

Representative Abe Hamadeh (R-AZ) voiced approval of an apparent directive by President Donald Trump authorizing the use of military force to battle the Mexican drug cartels in a recent post to X (formerly Twitter).

A recent New York Times article suggested that President Trump has ordered the Pentagon to begin drawing up how to confront cartels such as the El Salvadoran Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) and Venezuelan Tren de Aragua, along with other outfits designated as foreign terrorist organizations earlier this year.

The article further noted the legal hurdles such operations could potentially face, since the military is not considered a law enforcement branch, and how cartel members could be designated as enemy combatants under current law.

Nevertheless, Rep. Hamadeh said the authorization was "GOOD," using all-caps.

"Congressman Hamadeh has been CLEAR on how we should treat these barbarians," Rep. Hamadeh added, "We have to kill the Cartels."

Such strong support puts Hamadeh at odds with his colleague, Representative Eli Crane (R-AZ), who has previously discussed the idea with Cactus Politics in late January, saying that "President Trump only gets four years, and I do not know if that is an enemy that you can defeat or diminish in four years."

"We play a lot of politics up here in Washington, DC, and the pendulum swings back and forth every four to eight years," Rep. Crane elaborated, adding, "And if you do not take this threat seriously, and if you do not wipe them off the face of the earth, and if you decide that you are going to go on the offensive against them, they will most certainly go on the offensive against you, and so that is going to put a lot of Americans and a lot of elected officials in harm's way with a big target on their backs."

Nevertheless, Arizona lawmakers at the federal and state levels on both sides of the aisle all agree that the cartels are a threat, with Senator Mark Kelly (D-AZ) introducing the Counternarcotics Enhancement Act in July as the most recent example.