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How Obama's order to murder a U.S. citizen differs from Trump's illegal orders to murder people in boats on the high seas
Executive summary
Barack Obama’s administration developed a formal, internal framework (the Presidential Policy Guidance, PPG) that imposed specific constraints—such as geographic limits, a “near-certainty” standard to avoid civilian harm, and a preference for capture—while asserting authority to carry out targeted killings, including of U.S. citizen Anwar al-Awlaki (the strike that killed him being the most cited example) [1] [2]. Critics and rights groups say those constraints were largely secret, imperfectly transparent, and resulted in civilian deaths; by contrast, critics contend the Trump-era public policies removed or weakened many of Obama’s guardrails, broadened global reach, and lowered standards such as “near-certainty” to “reasonable certainty,” creating what the ACLU calls a more expansive license to kill [3] [4] [5].
1. How Obama’s order to kill a U.S. citizen fit inside a policy architecture
The Obama administration built and partially disclosed a targeted‑killing architecture that sought to limit strikes outside active battlefields through rules and internal oversight: it produced casualty tallies, issued an executive order on civilian-protection procedures, and prepared a redacted Presidential Policy Guidance (PPG) that emphasized constraints such as geographic proxies, identification standards, and a preference for capture where feasible [2] [6]. The most prominent instance often cited is the killing of Anwar al‑Awlaki, an American citizen targeted as an operational leader of al‑Qaeda; the strike became a flashpoint because it applied lethal force against a U.S. citizen outside a traditional battlefield and prompted legal challenges and policy debate [1] [7].
2. Legal claims and secrecy around Obama’s authority
Obama’s team argued it had authority to use lethal force against Americans who were operationally linked to al‑Qaeda or associated forces outside zones of active hostilities; when challenged, government lawyers asked courts to defer—arguing such decisions raised “political questions” and invoking the state‑secrets privilege in litigation like Al‑Aulaqi v. Obama [7]. Human rights organizations and legal critics accepted that limits were articulated but said disclosure was insufficient to evaluate legality or civilian harm, noting released data and the executive order still left many substantive questions unanswered [2] [6].
3. Civilian harm and the limits of “surgical” rhetoric
Investigations and NGOs reported hundreds of civilian deaths from strikes in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia during the Obama years; The Bureau of Investigative Journalism estimated between 384 and 807 civilian deaths in those theaters and highlighted concerns that strikes conducted “outside active battlefields” carried high civilian risk despite administration claims of precision [3]. Human Rights First and others argued that while policy steps toward transparency existed, they were insufficient for public assessment of individual strike legality and civilian toll [2].
4. How Trump’s approach differed, according to advocates and critics
Civil‑liberties groups and other critics say the Trump administration dismantled or loosened many Obama-era guardrails: the publicly available Presidential Policy (PSP) under Trump reportedly omitted reference to “areas outside of active hostilities,” removed limiting language about affiliates, and weakened standards (e.g., from “near‑certainty” to what was reported as “reasonable certainty”), thereby expanding geographic scope and lowering review thresholds—changes the ACLU and others warn create a broader, less constrained killing authority [4] [5]. The effect, these organizations argue, is to increase legal uncertainty about where and against whom lethal force can be used [4].
5. Competing perspectives and implicit agendas
Administration defenders (not fully represented in the provided sources) historically argued that internal procedures and oversight protected civilians and national security, framing tough choices as necessary in a diffuse, transnational terrorism threat; critics counter that secrecy and legal arguments asserting near‑plenary executive power mask constitutional and international law problems [2] [7]. Advocacy groups such as the ACLU and Human Rights First aim to push for transparency and judicial review—an agenda that privileges civil‑liberties oversight and constrains executive discretion [4] [2].
6. What the available reporting does and does not say
Available sources document the existence of Obama’s policy architecture, the specific case of Anwar al‑Awlaki, reported civilian casualties, and critiques that Trump’s policies removed or diluted key constraints [1] [3] [4] [2]. Available sources do not mention operational details of every strike, nor do they provide a court ruling definitively resolving the constitutional question over a president’s authority to kill U.S. citizens abroad; on that point, litigation and classification claims (e.g., state secrets) limited judicial resolution [7].
Conclusion: reporting and advocacy organizations agree that the Obama era introduced formal limits and internal rules—while simultaneously exercising broad, secretive lethal‑force powers—and that subsequent policy shifts under Trump, as described by civil‑liberties groups, removed or weakened several of those constraints, widening the executive’s practical latitude to use lethal force globally [2] [4] [5].