House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) on Thursday refrained from commenting on the appropriateness of using drones to target Americans overseas, but he did say that Congress would investigate the death of four such U.S. citizens since 2009, which the government formally disclosed yesterday.
“Our committees will look to determine the appropriateness of that action,” he told reporters at a weekly press conference in Washington.
In a letter to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Attorney General Eric Holder acknowledged that the U.S. targeted and killed an al Qaeda cleric and American citizen, Anwar al-Awlaki, in Yemen in 2011. Holder also said that three other Americans were previously killed in counterterrorism operations overseas.
Boehner added that he would await President Barack Obama’s speech today at National Defense University, where he is expected to address national security policy and drones in particular, before commenting on the matter further.
“I’ll wait to see what the president has to say about his revised drone policy,” Boehner said. “I want to see the facts.”
