Oil Prices Spike as Iran War Hits Third Week

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0:34Like Dan and Hannah, who always wait up to make sure their daughter gets back to her college dorm room. Or Tiffany, who's running late as usual, and her friends are tracking her trip to make sure she's actually on her way. Look, she's right there. She's three minutes away. Or Sam, who never goes anywhere without her roommate knowing exactly where she is. Some journeys are meant to be shared. Share your ride in real time with Share My Trip on Uber. One more way Uber is putting safety at every turn. Learn more on the Uber app. Welcome to The Beat, everyone. As we begin this week, Monday evening, we're tracking a lot of stories, including the increasing problems with Donald Trump's Iran war, the way he started it, the way he's running it.

1:13Risks multiplying, oil prices are up, as everybody knows. And as we begin the third week of a unilateral war, endgame, very unclear. Andrew Weissman will also be here later tonight as Trump tries to gut the First Amendment as we know it. That's a story related to the war because they are trying to censor the right of the free press from the Wall Street Journal and the Murdoch Empire all the way to other outlets as well. And we're going to cover that without fear or favor here. We are not going to be censored. So I have that report, which is part legal and part just the freedom to do war reporting coming up.

1:51We begin, though, with how Donald Trump started this war alone, wanted to basically go it alone. This was an operation that did not involve consulting Congress, other countries, Europe, NATO. It was essentially a U.S. operation with one other country involved, Israel, but not any of the traditional allies that Republican and Democratic administrations have relied on in the Middle East and in general throughout really the last, say, 60 years of post-World War II foreign policy. And so going it alone was a choice, just as starting the war was a choice. And we are seeing very quickly how that choice is working.

2:25I'm going to show you the evidence, not opinion, not saying that the news has some monopoly on how to do foreign policy, but just what we're learning about that choice. I can tell you off top as we start the third week of the war that 13 American service members have been killed here. Another 200 have been injured. Some of those stories are harder to tell because we get the information as it comes. Pentagon has released information about the casualties, but we don't have voluminous videos or coverage of that. But keep in mind that human toll, it's rising. On the other side of the war, over 2 ,000 Iranians have been estimated killed.

3:04Today, Iran strikes hit Dubai, the area of Dubai's airport, one of the busiest in the world. Iran also hitting the U.S. embassy in Baghdad over the weekend. U.S. officials reporting 15 ,000 Iranian targets have now been struck. Today, multiple U.S. allies said that if Trump started this alone and wants to go it alone, well, fine. But they are rebuffing what seem like late, unstrategic calls by Donald Trump after starting alone to want allies to only come in when he tries to call them in. Some critics say desperately so. You see the Times headline, Allies Rebuff Trump's Appeal for Help in the Critical Strait of Hormuz, which relates to all of the surging gas prices.

3:43Those officials include Germany, Japan, Italy, and Australia saying they're not helping right now. Now, that doesn't mean that couldn't change over time, but it is how, as I mentioned to you, the go-it-alone approach is working. Donald Trump acted without allies for the first two weeks, give or take. Now he wants them in, and they're saying no. A reminder that even the awesome unilateral power of the United States does not solve all military and economic challenges. Again, that's just the reality out there. There's hundreds of millions of barrels of oil now that are estimated essentially stuck in the Persian Gulf.

4:16And the oil industry telling the White House this fuel crunch, which has only just begun, will, if things don't change, it will, quote, likely worsen. Experts also say that Donald Trump's other ideas to deal with this involve more military engagement. For example, the kind of quasi-Pentagon capitalist team of escorting oil tankers. And it's not clear how much Americans would really tolerate that effort, expenditure, or the risk of American lives just as a stopgap to get some commercial Exxon oil tankers moving around. Then there's the question of sending in ground troops. That stoking warning is that Trump could be facing something we've seen from all the way back to early Vietnam, to the Iraq surge and a heck of a lot of other stories that if you're watching this, if you're hearing my voice in America or watching on YouTube abroad, just about everybody knows this history.

5:13Maybe Donald Trump didn't, but it's called the escalation trap. And it's what happens when you have open ended commitments and you are the bomber or the occupier, whether by air or land. And the other side of the war, people fighting for their country and lives. Trump was warned about the scenario in advance. The Joint Chiefs told him, according to reports in multiple office briefings, that's kind of one of the most important kind, that Iran would deploy mines, drones and missiles to close the world's most vital shipping lane. So if you're busy living your life and you're not thinking about the Strait of Hormuz all that often, that's fine.

5:45But the Pentagon and our 17 intelligence agencies have laid this out for a long time. And the journal has the reporting, which might make aspects of Trump's leadership look bad, but they have the reporting that he was told this in advance. That's relevant to how the Trump administration is also trying to censor coverage in the Wall Street Journal. We'll get to that. Trump was, quote, frustrated with all this. Now you see, of course, tankers on fire. Now, in the reporting, Trump then asked, well, why could the U.S. immediately reopen the state of Hormuz? So that's later, according to the Times, different reporting, again, multiple outlets corroborating this.

6:22The very thing he was told would happen, it would be hard to just fix, even with our mighty military. He then has to ask about after the fact. This is increasing the scrutiny on the leadership, the competence, the war planning of a self-declared wartime president who might have thought that what he did to a small country in the South American landscape could just be repeated anywhere else, and that the warnings he's hearing, he either didn't absorb, didn't believe, or didn't understand, which is kind of worse, what it really meant, where we were headed, and who would pay the price. Today, the president suggests the Mideast attack was some kind of, quote, habit.

7:06So we don't need it, but we did it. It's almost, you could say we did it out of habit, which is not a good thing to do. You could call that the kind of candor or blurting that you sometimes hear. The president, of course, has jumped around on rationales and defenses. Now he's sort of voicing, for whatever reason, a kind of a critique or a negative view of why we did this, because we just do this every so often. This is a serious matter, but sometimes, as we know, culture and comics kind of wrap it all up together. Saturday Night Live was giving Donald Trump quite the hard time over the weekend, mocking many aspects of this, including something that just about everyone knows about, in contrast to every other major Mideast war we have faced over the last 30 years.

7:54This is the only one where there has not been an actual reason, an actual goal shared. Everybody remembers post 9-11 Afghanistan, which turned out to be a complex endeavor. But the rationale was toppling a regime that had helped terrorists. So they said the Taliban had to go. That's what we call regime change. The Iraq war was sold on WMD. Whether it was true or not, there was a reason you have to stop the WMD. This war, as of this third week, doesn't have a consistent rationale from the president of the White House, something that is riskable. Take a look. If you're wondering why I was in the back seat of this random family's car, I'll tell you the same thing I say when people ask about our plans for Iran.

8:38I don't know.

8:43Pentagon doesn't know the impression of the Pentagon chief there, says the same thing. He doesn't know the president. if he knows he's not telling and not telling it as one consistent rationale. I want to bring in our expert tonight. Tom Nichols is a professor emeritus of national security affairs at the esteemed U.S. Naval War College, also writes for The Atlantic. Welcome. Thanks, Ari. Thanks for having me. You've got a career that deals in the planning and the research around these type of activities before they happen, whether or not they ever happen. So I'm curious, first, your assessment of the evident war planning that's gone into this as we start week three.

9:23Any concerns you might have? I took through some of the reporting. Well, the lesson we always teach our students is operations have to be matched to strategies, that there has to be some goal. Simply being good at operations, which, you know, the U.S. military is without question. that's not really an answer to the part the civilians have to provide, which is, why are we doing this? What's the point of these operations? If we succeed in enough of these operations, what are they supposed to build to? And how does that lead to some kind of victory that then lets you know that you're done? And I think none of that's been happening.

10:03And I think the fault really rests here with the civilians. I mean, I taught for years, I taught the planning process and the policy process. There's no process here. The process is whatever Donald Trump happens to be thinking in any given moment. And that's not really the best way to get advice or to plot out a war. It's clear that he was told by the military the many things that could happen. But I suspect he thought, as he so often seems to, that he thought he was the smartest person in the room, that he knew that the Iranians would surrender, whatever that means, long before this became a problem.

10:41And now three weeks going into three weeks. Here we are. If the U.S. wanted to lean on allies to deal with the strait, would it have been better to try to confer more with those allies in advance? Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, part of what you're seeing here, I mean, there aren't a whole lot of people in Europe or anywhere else, you know, crying tears for the Iranian regime. What you're seeing are European nations who don't want to be dragged into a conflict by somebody who's as erratic and unpredictable and I would even say obviously now in way over his head as the president and his team. Because that's the other problem here.

11:29Normally, when you're talking about getting your allies on board, you try to send trusted advisors and cabinet members. Who are you going to send to Europe to try to explain this or to try and gain allied support? Pete Hegseth? Marco Rubio can't do everything. He's already the head of the National Security Council and the Secretary of State. And I don't know if he's still the archivist, but he can't do that alone. And we just didn't do any of that. And you can't simply snap your fingers. I think Donald Trump doesn't understand that other countries are not just subsidiaries of the United States or kind of subunits that he happens to own.

12:11And you can't just snap your fingers and say, OK, forget everything I said before this. Now get in here and help us. Yeah. And final question, a former Republican Energy Secretary this week trying to kind of remind people that he says the Strait of Hormuz is the mother of all choke points. You can't really go on in normal economics without it. Does that mean if we continue in this, whatever these three weeks have been, if we have three more weeks like this, does that become both an economic and security problem for the United States? i'm not an economist but i'll say it's already a security problem um this was the you know the worst outcome well of in terms of the straits this is exactly um what trump was probably warned about but it's even worse than that because somehow the iranians are getting in and out of the straits they're just choking it off for everybody else and so you know three more weeks of this, I think that the economic effects are already in motion.

13:12And even if all of this stops tomorrow, the ripple effect is we're going to be feeling that for a while. But if this goes on for another two, three weeks, that's really going to be a major impact. Yeah. Tom Nichols leading us off. Thank you very much. I mentioned this censorship effort. I have a special report on that here with Andrew Weissman next.

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15:12I actually make it pretty frivolous because our media companies who have no credibility whatsoever are putting out information that they know as false. That is very dangerous. I think they can be serious journalism. Donald Trump dialing up attacks in the First Amendment. He's floundering in the Iran war, but he is trying to now abuse power in a likely illegal way to censor coverage. He posted about, quote, treason and other clearly false type, you know, scare tactics. But moments after that post, he was also threatening them on Air Force One, as you hear, and clashing with reporters when he didn't like questions.

16:02I think it's maybe the most corrupt news organization. The rally that everybody, including ABC, your network is the worst. A totally AI-generated fake news story put out by news organizations in the U.S. and elsewhere. Honestly, they really shouldn't be alerted. Can you put one more cell to the 5 ,000 of the leaders? Yeah, it's very of that, says President. The president lashing out. It's not just rhetoric. There is an effort, very likely unlawful, to abuse government power to censor war coverage and to retaliate or extort positive coverage out of independent media in the United States. This is happening now.

16:53This story broke over the weekend, and it's a big one. The head of the FCC, who has lost other plots, including going after Jimmy Kimmel, you right, remember, is now saying that he will do something that is probably illegal, that courts would stop if they do it, try to revoke broadcaster licenses for their First Amendment protected free speech rights. Now, again, some of this failed when he tried to go after Kimmel and ABC, but even the failed plots to censor and attack free speech can have consequences in our country. Senator Ron Johnson, a Republican, saying this is not right. I'm a big supporter of the First Amendment.

17:32I do not like the heavy hand of government, no matter who's wielding it. So no, I would rather the federal government stay out of the private sector as much as possible. And really, the federal government's role is to protect our freedoms, protect our constitutional rights.

17:50Politically, when you've lost boss, Ron Johnson, you know you're really out there. But this is not just a political thing. This is the First Amendment freedom to report on the war factually, no matter what it says about the current government or Trump administration, and your right to discuss it. You have every much right to dissent from this war if you choose, or to support this war if you choose. But both and all things are protected. And your government right now, you need to know and understand, is admitting an anti-First Amendment, likely illegal, I say that because this new plot hasn't been ruled on yet, but likely illegal effort to silence the press and to intimidate dissent.

18:30And if you're curious in keeping track, again, not that it matters, but one of the outlets they're going after is the Rupert Murdoch-owned, Fox News sister outlet, Wall Street Journal. For those who thought Trump would leave them alone, this is another example of where there There isn't even a type of pseudo-loyalty. He will go after anyone who exercises their rights if they interfere with his autocratic power grab. I'm joined by Andrew Weissman, our legal eagle. Andrew, your thoughts on this story tonight? Well, there's so many examples of things like this, starting with the law firms where numerous executive orders were struck down as violating the First Amendment, the First Amendment rights of lawyers to take on cases and to be heard in court.

19:19We saw it most recently with the effort by this administration to indict six sitting members of Congress for having the temerity to do what? To issue a video that accurately stated the law about the military members being able to refuse to follow illegal orders, and they sought to indict them. So it's both a violation of the First Amendment, and it has this sort of terrorizing effect to sort of get people to obey and advance. I would point out historically, this is exactly what happened during World War II with the international reporters who were in Germany trying to document the rise of Hitler in Germany, and they were not allowed to issue any reports about what was going on in Germany unless and until they were sanitized and approved by that administration.

20:22I'm not trying to say it's an apples-to-apples comparison. The idea is that this is a tactic of authoritarian regimes to control the information flow. You can leave Hitler out of it, too, and say that the First Amendment bars viewpoint discrimination and government powers being abused to change that which otherwise people would say in their reporting or their press, which quite clearly seems to be what Brendan Carr admits, no? Yeah, the reason I do think Germany, though, is relevant is that there was an effort there to report on what was actually happening, the harm that was happening within Germany about the casualties, about the errors, about the mistakes.

21:10And if you only want a rosy picture, you should not be in the United States. You should be in Hungary or in Russia, in Ukraine when it was controlled by Russia. Those are authoritarian regimes where you have state run media and you don't have access to people like you, Ari, who are not afraid to speak truth to power. But that is what's going on now. Yeah. And we hear the threats and the censorship and we are not changing a thing. But when you look at the wider context, someone listening to us right now tonight might say, well, The Wall Street Journal is fighting back the other lawsuit. They're going to keep going.

21:54OK, Ari and Andrew are going to keep going. So maybe this doesn't move the needle. And I'm I'm I have to report that's not the case. Some of this has already been effective because I want to play for you. during war, the Pentagon secretary referring to how the Trump administration may be abusing its powers to regulate the Justice Department, where you once worked, regulate antitrust. They have every right to patrol monopolies. But he is saying, basically admitting that they want to have their friends like the Ellisons win over control of CNN and other places and then get different coverage. Take a look.

22:30Fake news from CNN. Reports that the Trump administration underestimated the Iran war's impact on the Strait of Hormuz. Patently ridiculous, of course. For decades, Iran has threatened shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. This is always what they do, hold the Strait hostage. CNN doesn't think we thought of that. It's a fundamentally unserious report. The sooner David Ellison takes over that network, the better. He's directly saying that Ellison, who is the current lead bidder having vanquished Netflix, should change editorial to be friendlier to Trump when they get control of CNN. And this is before the Trump administration has approved that entire process.

23:19Is that OK at the DOJ? All of this is, to me, is going to result in the same kind of lawsuits based on the First Amendment. And, you know, it's what we saw, as you mentioned, with Jimmy Kimmel. You can ask Stephen Colbert about the effort to have him not bring on a guest. He had to go to YouTube to bring on a guest because CBS was going to obey and advance his words about what was going on there. And so, you know, this is something that is actually happening now. And to say, yes, there are some voices where people are saying, you know what, I'm not going to be afraid to speak out doesn't mean that there still isn't a huge effect.

24:06The law firms, which obviously I'm very familiar with, is a really good example of that, where there are, you know, scores of law firms that have either publicly or privately caved to the administration, leaving really sort of mid -sized firms and small firms to do a lot of the work that previously was done by very large firms to take on what they think are and often are illegal activities by the government. That's how our process works. It's supposed to be one where you go to court, you make your arguments, but you don't try and win by changing access to the facts so that everyone only hears one side of the story.

24:50Yeah. And then, Andrew, you say at times the Trump folks seem to be getting progress by dragging these things out. So even if they don't win the case against some of these individuals, you mentioned the revenge cases. It costs a lot of money. It drags out. People are on trial, et cetera. Harassment, as one judge put it. Interestingly, late in the week, that got flipped on its head. Trump lost the ability to use what they're calling the judge called harassment subpoenas. And it was shut down earlier in the case of the Fed, which also undercuts one of Trump's ploys in the midterm. So I was really curious what you thought about a judge going at that earlier.

25:29Obviously, the subpoena standard is pretty low and you can brief us on that. And so I wanted you to give the breakdown of that Trump loss and whether it matters that it came faster. Let's get into that. We're going to fit in a break. Andrew stays. We'll get into that next.

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