The Left Was Silent When Obama Killed Americans Without Due Process

Last week, in a scene straight from a Portland fever dream, a group of protestors in hand-knit “No Borders, No Nations” scarves took to the streets to demand “due process” for criminal illegal aliens being deported. One activist even performed slam poetry, complete with bongos and interpretive dance, about how ICE is “murdering dreams with legal schemes.” This would be hilarious if it weren’t so grotesquely unserious.

The left wants us to believe that deporting someone who entered the country illegally—often with a criminal record—is a violation of civil rights. They cry “fascism!” when ICE enforces the law. But here’s the question that rips their narrative wide open: Where was this moral outrage when Barack Obama was drone-striking American citizens without so much as a court hearing?

Yes, that happened. During the Obama-Biden years, at least seven American citizens were killed in drone strikes. Anwar al-Awlaki, a U.S. citizen born in New Mexico, was targeted and executed in Yemen in 2011 based on a secret legal memo. No indictment. No trial. Just the President, a drone, and an executive “kill list.” Two weeks later, his 16-year-old son Abdulrahman—also a U.S. citizen—was obliterated in a separate strike while eating dinner. He wasn’t on any list. He wasn’t even a suspect. He was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. The government called it a “mistake.” And that was that.

Samir Khan, Jude Kenan Mohammad, Ahmed Farouq, and Adam Gadahn—all American citizens—also died without trial. None were given due process. Some weren’t even the intended targets. Only Anwar al-Awlaki was explicitly named. The others were what the government casually terms “collateral damage.”

Where was the poetry then? Where were the protestors banging on courthouse doors, screaming about constitutional violations? Where were the sobbing celebrities with megaphones and hashtags? Nowhere. They were silent because it was their president in charge of the joystick.

The Obama administration carried out over 500 drone strikes during his tenure, killing thousands—including hundreds of civilians, according to independent estimates. The legal foundation for this policy was a 2011 Department of Justice memo that argued due process could be fulfilled internally by the executive branch, with no judicial oversight whatsoever. The ACLU called this “a violation of the Constitution’s guarantee of due process” and sued. Twice. And twice, the cases were dismissed on procedural grounds. In one ruling, the federal judge admitted the strikes raised “serious constitutional questions” but claimed the issue was a “political question,” not a legal one.

The ACLU didn’t mince words: “If the president can label an American citizen a threat and order their death in secret, without oversight, then no constitutional protection is safe.” That quote should’ve echoed from every protest rally. Instead, it was drowned out by silence.

And yet today, those same voices scream about deportations of criminal illegal aliens as if sending someone back to their home country after due process in immigration court is the moral equivalent of summary execution. They claim ICE is the Gestapo, that America is becoming a fascist regime. They glue themselves to city hall steps, recite angsty rhymes about imaginary fascism, and launch boycotts against conservative taco trucks. All while pretending they’ve never heard of Abdulrahman al-Awlaki.

Let’s be absolutely clear: criminal illegal aliens go through legal proceedings. Immigration courts. Hearings. Appeals. In fact, many are afforded more rights than U.S. citizens who get caught in the crosshairs of a drone strike. Obama’s administration killed Americans without trials. The left said nothing. Today, the left throws a tantrum because someone who broke the law might get a plane ticket home.

That silence? That’s complicity. That’s the sound of a movement that only pretends to care about rights—when it’s politically convenient. So next time you hear a progressive poet wailing about due process, ask them this: Where was your outrage when your president became judge, jury, and executioner?

Because if you didn’t care when a teenager was droned at a picnic table in Yemen, spare us the slam poetry now.