In November, the Pentagon said it was investigating Sen. Mark Kelly (a retired Navy captain) for “serious allegations of misconduct” because he appeared in a video telling US troops they do not have to follow illegal orders. The video was made in response to attacks by the Trump administration on boats in Latin American water, alleged to be carrying drugs.
Now, the Pentagon is escalating that review into an official “command investigation.” This means the military could take disciplinary action against Kelly.
Kelly responded to the escalated investigation earlier this week, saying: “It should send a shiver down the spine of every patriotic American that the president and secretary of defense would abuse their power to come after me or anyone this way. It wasn’t enough for Donald Trump to say I should be hanged. It wasn’t enough for Pete Hegseth to threaten me with a court martial. Now they are threatening everything I fought and served for across twenty-five years in the US Navy — all because I repeated something every service member is taught.”
All this and more about matters of national security and the First Amendment in this conversation with Steve Vladeck, a professor at Georgetown Law and the author of One First, a newsletter about the Supreme Court.
