ABSTRACT
In March 2012, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder defended the use of drones, including those that target U.S. citizens, claiming that the president has the authority to kill anyone he deems an enemy of the state. Holder’s defense occurred around the time it was discovered that President Obama had “deployed drones against terrorism suspects in an unprecedented way” ( Johnson, 2012, para. 3). Holder explained that the United States’ “legal authority is not limited to the battlefi elds in Afghanistan,” but rather anywhere the United States is given consent or deems the nation “unable or unwilling to deal effectively with a threat to the United States” ( Johnson, 2012, para. 14).
