Overview
- MAGA activist and Trump ally Laura Loomer said fentanyl is not manufactured in Venezuela and urged focus on Mexican cartels and China, questioning the Pentagon’s boat strikes.
- A DEA assessment ties U.S. fentanyl supplies to China-based chemical firms and Mexican criminal groups and does not list Venezuela as a fentanyl source.
- Experts and a U.S. counternarcotics official say Venezuela is largely a cocaine transshipment route, often to Europe, rather than a fentanyl pipeline to the United States.
- Military officials told lawmakers the struck vessels carried cocaine, and Admiral Frank Bradley testified a targeted boat was not bound for the United States.
- President Trump continues to claim each strike saves 25,000 American lives, a figure rejected by fact‑checkers, while lawmakers probe a September strike following double‑tap allegations.