Rachel Abrams

But our conversation was not prompted by the question of whether the entire operation to fire on these boats is illegal, right?

And I am curious, as somebody who has been following every turn of the story and is a national security expert, what do you think about this focus on

very specifically on the second strike?

On Tuesday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said that he had watched the September 2nd operation live on video, but said that he, quote, didn't stick around to see the second strike.

Hegseth also stood by Admiral Frank Bradley's decision to order the second strike.

We'll be right back.

Here's what else you need to know today.

— President Trump unleashed a xenophobic tirade against Somali immigrants on Tuesday.

— It was an outburst that captured the raw nativism that has animated his approach to immigration.

The administration has focused on a recent investigation into fraud within the Somali community in Minnesota, where federal prosecutors charged dozens of people with felonies, including accusations that people stole hundreds of millions of dollars from a government program meant to keep children fed during the COVID-19 pandemic.

And Matt Van Epps, a Republican former state official and Army veteran, won a special election for the House on Tuesday in Tennessee, holding off a surprisingly stiff Democratic challenge in an overwhelmingly Republican district that drew a flood of national attention and money.

The result is a boon in the short term for President Trump and the Republican Party, which had worried that its narrow House majority would grow even slimmer.

But the relatively tight margin in a deep red district still represents a warning shot about the party's vulnerabilities ahead of next year's midterms.

Today's episode was produced by Rob Zipko and Jessica Chung.

It was edited by Lizzo Balin and Paige Cowett.

It contains music by Alicia Baitube and Diane Wong and was engineered by Alyssa Moxley.

That's it for The Daily.

I'm Rachel Abrams.

See you tomorrow.

From The New York Times, I'm Rachel Abrams, and this is The Daily.