Rand Paul: I'll Filibuster Drone Memo Author

Rand Paul has vowed to do his best to block another President Obama nominee over drone policy. The GOP senator from Kentucky says he plans to filibuster the nomination of David Barron to the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals over Barron's authorship of at least two memos justifying drone strikes on American citizens without a trial, reports CNN. Paul says he has seen one of the memos and while he can't disclose its contents, he saw "no valid legal precedent to justify the killing of an American citizen not engaged in combat."

"I can't imagine appointing someone to the federal bench ... without fully understanding that person's views concerning the extrajudicial killing of American citizens," Paul writes in a New York Times op-ed. "But President Obama is seeking to do just that." In another protest against drone policy, Paul spoke for 13 hours last year in an old-style filibuster against the nomination of John Brennan as CIA director. Some Democrats may also oppose Barron's nomination, reports the Hill, including Oregon's Sen. Ron Wyden, who has clamored for the Obama administration to release the memos justifying the strikes. (More Rand Paul stories.)