Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is attempting to distance himself from the first U.S. airstrike on September 2 that targeted two shipwrecked men who had survived an earlier U.S. strike on a boat the Pentagon says was carrying drugs, without providing evidence. Legal experts say the strike was likely a war crime. Last week, The Washington Post reported Hegseth had given a verbal order to “kill everybody” on the boat. Hegseth spoke Tuesday during a White House Cabinet meeting.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth: “I watched that first strike live. As you can imagine, at the Department of War, we’ve got a lot of things to do. So I didn’t stick around for the hour and two hours, whatever, where all the sensitive site exploitation digitally occurs. So I moved on to my next meeting. A couple of hours later, I learned that that commander had made the — which he had the complete authority to do, and, by the way, Admiral Bradley made the correct decision to ultimately sink the boat and eliminate the threat.”

Hegseth was sitting right next to President Trump during the three-hour Cabinet meeting, in which Trump appeared to fall asleep several times.
Since September, the U.S. has bombed at least 21 boats in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean, killing more than 80 people.

Meanwhile, the family of a Colombian fisherman killed in a U.S. boat strike on September 15 has filed a complaint against the U.S. with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. The family of Alejandro Carranza Medina says he was the victim of an “extrajudicial killing.”

In more news from the region, a bipartisan group of lawmakers have introduced a War Powers Resolution to block the Trump administration from engaging in hostilities against Venezuela without congressional authorization.

Israel announced that it plans to reopen the Rafah border crossing as part of the U.S.-brokered ceasefire, but only to allow Palestinians to leave Gaza. According to the World Health Organization, more than 16,500 sick and wounded people need to leave Gaza for medical care. This comes as Israel says that the partial remains returned by Hamas do not match the two hostages remaining in Gaza. Palestinian militants are reportedly struggling to find the remains amid the rubble. Meanwhile, Israel has continued its drone strikes in Gaza, killing Palestinian photojournalist Mahmoud Wadi in Khan Younis. This is his father, Issam Wadi.

Issam Wadi: “As a father, I received the news with shock. It was like an earthquake at home. I live in a tent. The tent was blown away when I lost my son. He was hit in an abnormal strike, which we weren’t expecting on a day like this.”

President Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow for nearly five hours on Tuesday, but a deal to end the war in Ukraine was not reached. Russian officials described the talks as constructive but said “no compromise” was reached on certain issues. Earlier today, Germany’s foreign minister criticized Russia, saying he had seen “no serious willingness on the Russian side to enter into negotiations.”
Meanwhile, the European Union has agreed to ban natural gas from Russia by late 2027. On Tuesday, Putin warned Europe that Russia was ready for war if it is provoked. This comes as NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte vowed to keep up the supply of U.S. weapons to Ukraine.

Mark Rutte: “The best way to put pressure on the Russians is by doing two things. One is making sure that the Russians understand that the weapon flow into Ukraine will keep on going. That’s exactly what’s happening today, thanks to the U.S., thanks to the Europeans. The U.S. is sending its crucial gear to Ukraine, paid for by Canada and European allies.”

New details are emerging about President Trump’s decision to pardon former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, who was released from prison on Monday. Hernández was sentenced last year to 45 years in prison for trafficking hundreds of tons of cocaine into the United States. In October, Hernández wrote a four-page letter to Trump seeking a pardon, claiming he had been unfairly targeted by the Biden administration. The letter was delivered by longtime Trump adviser Roger Stone.

Some Republican lawmakers have openly criticized Trump’s decision. Republican Thom Tillis said, “It’s a horrible message. … It’s confusing to say, on the one hand, we should potentially even consider invading Venezuela for a drug trafficker, and on the other hand, let somebody go.” It is unclear if Hernández will attempt to stay in the United States or return to Honduras.

On Tuesday, some Hondurans in the capital Tegucigalpa criticized Trump for freeing Hernández and for meddling in Sunday’s election.

Jorge Meza: “I am against everything that is happening, because it’s an insult to Honduras, because Honduras really doesn’t deserve this. That’s because of a political aversion. They come and do this to our country, with all the damage Juan Orlando caused here in Honduras. So, all of us as Hondurans feel mocked, because another country comes to interfere in what we should be doing here in our own country.”

This all comes as Honduras continues to count votes from Sunday’s presidential election. The centrist Salvador Nasralla has taken a slim lead over conservative Nasry Asfura, who had been backed by Trump. On social media, Trump has claimed without evidence that Honduran election officials are trying to change the results of the race.

The Pentagon’s inspector general is set to release a report Thursday examining Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s sharing of sensitive information about U.S. strikes in Yemen on a Signal group chat earlier this year. The group chat, which included other senior members of the Trump administration, was revealed after Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor of The Atlantic, was accidentally added. According to Axios, a full version of the report has been sent to the Senate Armed Services Committee.

The Trump administration is launching an ICE operation to target hundreds of Somali immigrants in the Minneapolis-St. Paul region, according to reporting by The New York Times. An official speaking to the Times says nearly 100 immigration officers and agents from around the country have been tapped for the operation. The directive comes shortly after President Trump lashed out at the Somali community during a Cabinet meeting, calling them “garbage” he does not want in the country.

President Donald Trump: “I hear they ripped off — Somalians ripped off that state for billions of dollars, billions, every year, billions of dollars. And they contribute nothing. The welfare is like 88%. They contribute nothing. I don’t want them in our country, I’ll be honest with you, OK? … We could go one way or the other, and we’re going to go the wrong way if we keep taking in garbage into our country. Ilhan Omar is garbage. She’s garbage.”

Democratic Congressmember Ilhan Omar responded to President Trump’s attack in a post on social media, saying, “His obsession with me is creepy. I hope he gets the help he desperately needs.”

The Trump administration announced that it has paused green card and U.S. citizenship processing for immigrants from 19 countries already subject to a travel ban put in place earlier this year. This follows the Trump administration’s announcement that it was pausing all asylum decisions for immigrants currently in the U.S., after an Afghan national was charged with murdering a National Guard member and critically injuring another in Washington, D.C., last week. He’s pleaded not guilty.

The Trump administration fired eight immigration judges in New York City on Monday, according to the National Association of Immigration Judges. The fired judges worked at 26 Federal Plaza, which also houses the New York City headquarters for ICE. Since President Trump’s return to office, more than 100 immigration judges out of about 700 have been fired or pushed out.

The Trump administration is threatening to withhold money for food benefits under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program in most Democratic-controlled states next week, unless they share information on who exactly is receiving those benefits. Earlier this year, the agriculture secretary had requested the information to verify the eligibility of 42 million recipients. Soon after, 22 states and the District of Columbia sued the U.S. Department of Agriculture over the request. In October, a federal judge issued a temporary injunction that prevents the Department of Agriculture from demanding the data of recipients and cutting SNAP funds. On Tuesday, New York Governor Kathy Hochul wrote on social media, “Genuine question: Why is the Trump Administration so hellbent on people going hungry?”

In health news, a federal vaccine panel is preparing to vote this week to end the practice of vaccinating all newborns for hepatitis B. The panel, which was handpicked by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is also expected to discuss making other major changes to the childhood immunization schedule. Sean O’Leary of the American Academy of Pediatrics criticized the move, saying, “Any changes they do make could be devastating to children’s health and public health as a whole.”

A federal judge in Boston has blocked the Trump administration from cutting Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood and its affiliates across 22 states. The Democratic-led states sued the Trump administration back in July after the One Big Beautiful Bill contained a provision that barred Medicaid reimbursements to nonprofits that provide abortions. In her ruling, U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani said that the law would “increase the percentage of patients unable to receive birth control and preventive screenings, thereby prompting an increase in states’ healthcare costs.” Planned Parenthood responded to the ruling, saying, “The district court again recognized the 'defund' law for what it is: unconstitutional and dangerous.”

The Trump administration is reversing the reinstatement of 14 FEMA workers who signed a petition earlier this year warning that cuts to the agency were putting the U.S. at risk of repeating the mistakes made during the response to Hurricane Katrina. Soon after they signed the letter back in August, FEMA suspended the workers. Last Wednesday, they were reinstated, but hours later they were suspended again. Jeremy Edwards, a former FEMA official who signed the Katrina declaration, said that the back-and-forth over the status of the FEMA employees “represents the type of dysfunction and inefficiency that has plagued FEMA under this administration.”

Former U.S. treasury secretary and former Harvard President Larry Summers has been banned from the American Economic Association over his close ties to the late Jeffrey Epstein. Recently revealed emails show Summers stayed in close contact with Epstein long after the convicted sex offender’s 2008 conviction.

In Tennessee, Republican Matt Van Epps has defeated Democrat Aftyn Behn in a closely watched special election for a U.S. House seat. Van Epps won the race by around 9%, a far smaller margin than Trump’s 22-point victory in the district last year.

More than 1,350 people have now died in devastating floods and landslides in Sri Lanka, Indonesia and Thailand. Hundreds are still missing. Sri Lanka’s president described the flooding as the “largest and most challenging natural disaster in our history.” In Indonesia, the death toll has topped 700.