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tim kaine
'Serious Disregard for Human Life': Dem Senators Press Hegseth on Yemen Civilian Casualties
"President Trump has called himself a 'peacemaker,' but that claim rings hollow when U.S. military operations kill scores of civilians."
Apr 25, 2025
A trio of Democratic senators on Thursday demanded answers from embattled Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth regarding U.S. airstrikes in Yemen, which have reportedly killed scores of civilians including numerous women and children since last month.
"We write to you concerning reports that U.S. strikes against the Houthis at the Ras Isa fuel terminal in Yemen last week killed dozens of civilians, potentially more than 70," Sens. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), and Tim Kaine (D-Va.) wrote in a letter to Hegseth.
The lawmakers noted that "the United Nations Protection Cluster's Civilian Impact Monitoring Project has... assessed that March 2025 marked the highest monthly casualty count in Yemen in almost two years, tripling the previous month, with a total of 162 civilian casualties."
"If these reports of civilian casualties are accurate, they should come as no surprise," the senators said. "Using explosive weapons in populated areas—as these intense strikes appear to do—always carries a high risk of civilian harm."
"Further, reports suggest that the Trump administration plans to dismantle civilian harm mitigation policies and procedures at the Pentagon designed to reduce civilian casualties in U.S. operations," the letter notes. "And the Trump administration has already dismissed senior, nonpartisan judge advocates, or JAG officers, who provide critical legal counsel to U.S. warfighters, especially when it comes to the laws of war and adherence to U.S. civilian harm mitigation policies."
"The Defense Department also recently loosened the rules of engagement to allow [U.S. Central Command] and other combatant commands to conduct strikes without requiring White House sign-off, removing necessary checks and balances on crucial life-and-death decisions," the senators added. "Taken altogether, these moves suggest that the Trump administration is abandoning the measures necessary to meet its obligations to reducing civilian harm."
The senators asked Hegseth to answer the following questions:
- Has the Department of Defense (DOD) assessed the number of noncombatant and combatant casualties in each of its strikes inside Yemen?
- What has DOD's process been for assessing the acceptable civilian casualties for individual strikes inside Yemen, and assessing estimated levels of civilian harm and collateral damage?
- What role have legal advisers, including JAG officers, played in reviewing the legality of U.S. strikes in Yemen?
- What DOD instructions or orders currently govern department civilian harm mitigation and response actions?
- Were the civilian harm mitigation and response experts at CENTCOM and/or at the Civilian Protection Center of Excellence consulted in planning for these strikes?
- How does the department plan to engage with the families or communities affected by these strikes, including acknowledging civilian harm and exploring avenues for potential redress?
Last month, Hegseth
announced that the Pentagon's Civilian Harm Mitigation and Response Office and Civilian Protection Center of Excellence, which was established during the Biden administration, would be closed. Hegseth—who has
supported pardons for convicted U.S. war criminals—lamented during his Senate confirmation hearing that "restrictive rules of engagement" have "made it more difficult to defeat our enemies," who "should get bullets, not attorneys," according to his 2024 book The War on Warriors.
Asked during his confirmation hearing whether troops under his leadership would adhere to the Geneva Conventions, Hegseth replied, "What we are not going to do is put international conventions above Americans."
During his first administration, President Donald Trumprelaxed rules of military engagement meant to protect civilians as he followed through on his campaign pledge to "bomb the shit" out of Islamic State militants and "take out their families." Thousands of civilians were killed during the campaign against ISIS in Iraq and Syria as then-Defense Secretary James "Mad Dog" Mattis announced a shift from a policy of attrition to one of "annihilation."
Meanwhile, noncombatant casualties soared by over 300% in Afghanistan between the final year of the Obama administration and 2019.
Overall, upward of 400,000 civilians in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, and Yemen have died as a direct result of the U.S.-led War on Terror, according to the Costs of War Project at Brown University's Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs.
In Yemen, the U.K.-based monitor Airwars says U.S. forces have killed hundreds of civilians in 181 declared actions since 2002. Overall, hundreds of thousands of Yemenis have died during the civil war that began in 2014, with international experts attributing more than 150,000 Yemeni deaths to U.S.-backed, Saudi-led bombing and blockade.
The U.S. bombing of Yemen has not received nearly as much coverage in the corporate media as the scandal involving Hegseth's use of Signal chats to share plans for attacking the Middle Eastern country with colleagues, a journalist, and relatives. However, critics say the mounting backlash over the high civilian casualties there is belying Trump's claim of an anti-war presidency.
"President Trump has called himself a 'peacemaker,' but that claim rings hollow when U.S. military operations kill scores of civilians," the senators stressed in their letter. "The reported high civilian casualty numbers from U.S. strikes in Yemen demonstrate a serious disregard for civilian life, and call into question this administration's ability to conduct military operations in accordance with U.S. best practices for civilian harm mitigation and international law."
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Trump Advances Plan to Fill Federal Government With 'Political Cronies'
"Anyone who cares about our national security, or receives Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid... has a vested interest in protecting our merit-based federal workforce."
Apr 19, 2025
The largest federal labor union in the U.S. said Friday that tens of thousands of federal workers could soon "have their jobs politicized" and be swiftly fired under a new rule proposed by the Office of Personnel Management.
Under the rule, an estimated 50,000 career civil servants would be reclassified as "at-will" employees, removing civil service protections and making it easier for the federal government to dismiss them.
President Donald Trump and his billionaire ally, tech mogul Elon Musk, have long claimed the federal workforce is rife with "rogue bureaucrats" and is part of the "deep state," pledging to dismantle the civil service.
Trump said on his social media platform, Truth Social, that reclassifying workers "will allow the federal government to finally be 'run like a business.'"
"If these government workers refuse to advance the policy interests of the president, or are engaging in corrupt behavior, they should no longer have a job," he said.
"President Trump's action to politicize the work of tens of thousands of career federal employees will erode the government's merit-based hiring system and undermine the professional civil service that Americans rely on."
Everett Kelley, national president of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), said Friday's announcement was the latest "in a series of deliberate moves by this administration to corrupt the federal government and replace qualified public servants with political cronies."
"President Trump's action to politicize the work of tens of thousands of career federal employees will erode the government's merit-based hiring system and undermine the professional civil service that Americans rely on," said Kelley. "Politicizing the career civil service is a threat to our democracy and to the integrity of all the programs and services Americans rely on."
The new category for civil servants was originally called Schedule F, but the White House said it was changing the classification to "Schedule Policy/Career."
U.S. Sens. Tim Kaine and Mark Warner and Rep. Gerry Connolly, all Democrats from Virginia whose constituents include many federal employees, said Saturday that Trump's proposal to "hire and fire these workers based on their politics, not their qualifications... makes us all less safe."
The lawmakers have all backed legislation to protect the federal civil service from being reclassified outside of merit system principles without the approval of Congress, and issued a warning to congressional Republicans who have heard from angry constituents in recent weeks about the administration's spending cuts through the so-called Department of Government Efficiency.
"Anyone who cares about our national security, or receives Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, or any other critical service administered by the federal government, has a vested interest in protecting our merit-based federal workforce," said the lawmakers. "We have long fought for legislation to protect the federal workforce from this kind of attack. To our colleagues who will hear from their constituents if government services continue to decline because of this decision: You were warned."
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'Keep Calling': Warnings of 'Head Fake' as Schumer Claims Dem Unity Against GOP Funding Bill
One observer warned that top Democrats are "trying to fool their own supporters" about their position on the Republican Party's government funding legislation.
Mar 13, 2025
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a floor speech Wednesday that Republicans don't have enough support from his caucus to advance their partisan six-month government funding legislation, which would inflict large cuts to non-military spending and bolster the Trump administration's assault on federal agencies.
But Schumer's claim of Democratic unity following tense private caucus meetings was soon called into question as some members suggested the minority party could still cut a deal with Republicans to invoke cloture on the legislation—a move that would pave the way for passage of the bill with a simple-majority vote.
"Everybody in the caucus wants an opportunity to vote for a clean 30-day [continuing resolution] that puts us on a pathway to regular, legit appropriations," said Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), referring to an alternative government funding bill offered by Democratic appropriators ahead of the looming Friday shutdown.
"It's not an unreasonable ask to say, if you want cloture, you'd better give us a vote," Whitehouse added.
Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) similarly indicated that Democrats could be willing to help Republicans invoke cloture—which requires 60 votes—in exchange for votes on Democratic amendments.
If cloture is invoked, the GOP would no longer need Democratic support to push the bill through the Senate.
"Democrats had nothing to do with this bill," Kaine told reporters following a closed-door caucus meeting on Wednesday. "And we want an opportunity to get an amendment vote or two. So that's what we are insisting on to vote for cloture."
"Any Senate Dem who thinks their left flank, or anyone else in their base who is determined to stop Trump, would accept this strategy is deeply deluded."
Such remarks from Democrats led Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo to describe Schumer's floor speech as "a head fake."
"This is the Senate D caucus trying to fool their own supporters," Marshall argued. "Sorry to say that but that's what's happening."
In a blog post, Marshall wrote that "this was a deal between Schumer and [Senate Majority Leader John] Thune to allow a brief performative episode to throw Democratic voters off the scent while the Democratic caucus allowed the bill to pass."
"The deal is this: Democrats agree to give up the 60-vote threshold in exchange for being allowed to offer amendments to the House bill. The 'amendment' or 'amendments' will likely be some version of Sen. [Patty] Murray's 30-day CR. It doesn't even matter what they are. But this is all for show," he explained. "Once you give up the 60-vote threshold, the whole thing is over."
Progressive strategist Robert Cruickshank wrote late Wednesday that "any Senate Dem who thinks their left flank, or anyone else in their base who is determined to stop Trump, would accept this strategy is deeply deluded."
"This isn't even about left or right or center," Cruickshank wrote. "The divide within the Democratic Party is 'fight' versus 'surrender.'"
The new comments from Schumer and members of his caucus came amid a pressure campaign from House Democrats, grassroots organizers, advocacy groups, and the nation's largest union of federal workers urging senators to oppose the Republican funding bill, even if it means risking a government shutdown at the end of the week.
The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), which is engaged in legal fights against the Trump administration's large-scale attack on federal agencies,
wrote to senators on Wednesday that "a widespread government shutdown has been underway since January 20 and will continue to spread whether senators vote yes or no" on the Republican funding package.
"If H.R. 1968 becomes law—a measure that ignores the administration's brazen refusal to carry out duly enacted laws of Congress and further erodes Congress' power of the purse—AFGE knows that DOGE will dramatically expand its terminations of federal workers and double down on its campaign to make federal agencies fail because there will be nothing left to stop the administration for the balance of fiscal year 2025, if ever," the union wrote.
At least one Senate Democrat who was seen earlier Wednesday as a possible vote for the GOP, Sen. John Hickenlooper of Colorado, vowed later in the day to oppose both cloture and the Republican bill itself, a sign that public outrage could be having an impact.
"Keep calling. Keep up the pressure," Democratic strategist Matt McDermott wrote in response to the Colorado senator's opposition.
Senate Democrats are waking up: Hickenlooper said this morning he was leaning towards backing the CR. But at a town hall tonight he publicly commits to voting No — including on cloture. Keep calling. Keep up the pressure.
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— Matt McDermott ( @mattmfm.bsky.social) March 12, 2025 at 10:18 PM
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), who has been urging Democratic senators to oppose the Republican bill, wrote Wednesday night that "House Democrats have stayed in D.C. to pass a 30-day clean government funding extension."
"We are here to avert a shutdown and give Republicans the time they need to negotiate a bipartisan agreement," Ocasio-Cortez added. "I'm here in D.C. ready to vote on a clean CR, and so is everyone else. Let's do it."
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