Eric Holder: Drone Strike To Kill U.S. Citizen On American Soil Legal, Hypothetically

HuffPost, Posted: 03/05/2013 5:11 pm EST | Updated: 03/05/2013 11:41 pm EST

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration believes it could technically use military force to kill an American on U.S. soil in an "extraordinary circumstance" but has "no intention of doing so," U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said in a letter disclosed Tuesday.

Holder's March 4 letter was disclosed by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who had asked whether the Justice Department believed President Barack Obama had the legal authority to order a targeted strike against an American citizen located within the United States.

The Obama administration, Holder said, rejected the use of military force where "well-established law enforcement authorities in this country provide the best means for incapacitating a terrorist threat." But in theory, it'd be legal for the president to order such an attack under certain circumstances, Holder said.

"The question you have posed is therefore entirely hypothetical, unlikely to occur, and one we hope no president will ever have to confront. It is possible, I suppose, to imagine an extraordinary circumstance in which it would be necessary and appropriate under the Constitution and applicable laws of the United States for the President to authorize the military to use lethal force within the territory of the United States," Holder wrote.

(More here.)