In an exclusive interview with The Floridian, Congressman Mario Díaz-Balart (R) accused Democrat lawmakers of hypocrisy for pushing back against President Donald Trump’s military attacks against drug cartels in Venezuela when former President Barack Obama was “very aggressive in using the U.S. military to take out terrorists.”
“It's interesting that the Democrats are pushing back on taking out literally the folks that are bringing poison to the United States. The president has designated these narco cartels, rightfully so, as terrorist organizations. I remember, you know, President Obama was very aggressive in using the U.S. military to take out terrorists, including, by the way, remember, he killed a 16-year-old American citizen. And I never criticized President Obama for taking out terrorists,” Rep. Díaz-Balart remarked. “It's ironic that the Democrats are complaining about taking out, you know, narco boats coming to the United States.”
Rep. Diaz-Balart further elaborated on how “it’s about time” action was taken against Venezuela, the cartels, and the government, as more Americans suffer from drug addictions and death as a result of Venezuelan drugs crossing the border into the U.S.
“It's about time. We have a president who is taking the murdering and the poisoning of our American youth seriously," he added. "So, literally, every time you take out one of these boats, or you take out a ring, or you take out a road, you're directly saving American lives."
The congressman from South Florida continued, contrasting the amount of Americans killed by drug overdoses over the past decade to the number of Americans killed during the two world wars and a couple other U.S. military conflicts.
"To put it in perspective, in the last 7 to 10 years, more Americans have died because of these narco cartels that are selling poison to the United States than we lost in World War I, World War II, Vietnam, and Korea,” he said.
Díaz-Balart concluded the interview by expressing gratitude for President Trump and his actions against Venezuela and narco terrorism.
“I'm very grateful to this president for doing that. I support this administration doing what they think they need to do to protect American lives from, you know, whether it's Cartel de los Soles in Venezuela, whether it's, you know, all these other cartels that, that are literally responsible for he loss of more American life than ISIS, than Al Qaeda, and all of them combined,” he concluded.
