Will Trump's Iran strikes hit him in the ballots?

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1:02This is a Global Player original podcast. The president made the very wise decision. We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action. We knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces. We didn't start this war. But under President Trump, we are finishing it. No, I might have forced their hand. You see, we were having negotiations with these lunatics. And it was my opinion that they were going to attack first. They were going to attack if we didn't do it. and I didn't want that to happen. So if anything, I might have forced Israel's hand. It's like we're in a bizarre multiple choice exam.

1:40Was it A, as Marco Rubio says, that the US was pushed into this by Israel? Was it B, as Pete Hegseth says, Iran, who fired first and America simply responded? Or was it C, as Donald Trump says, America that pushed Israel into it? for an explanation of what is going on in Iran and why it has been confusing in the extreme. And the more that administration leaders speak, the less clear it becomes. Welcome to the News Agents USA. The News Agents USA with Emily Maitlis and John Sopel. It's John and the last I could see, Emily was feeding a kangaroo in Melbourne. She's only been there 12 hours and she's already hassling poor kangaroos.

2:35Instead, in the studio, I'm delighted to welcome Michael Shear, who is the chief UK correspondent for the New York Times. When I was a sort of newbie in Washington as the BBC's North America editor, the first Obama trip on Air Force One, I went on. And Michael Scheer was the person who told me where I had to sit, what I had to do, what needed to happen. And so it's lovely to kind of have you back here in Britain. And makes us feel old, doesn't it? Well, it does a little bit, a tiny bit, but we're still very young at heart. So that is the main thing. Look, we are day four, day five into this conflict in Iran.

3:13I'm really struck by when this administration are very good communicators, how contradictory the explanations have been about why and why now and what what it's for and what does the end look like? Yeah, I mean, I think the contradictory nature and the dissonance between their explanations in part reflects the clash of two different kinds of government. You've got the professional government, which often kicks into gear in any administration during a war, right? The Pentagon, the National Security Establishment, the State Department, they all have processes that have been in place forever. They do meetings, they do briefings, they map out, they do war games.

4:01All of this stuff is, you know, Democrat or Republican for ages. That's what they do. And then you have this Trump process, which essentially is government by tweet. We used to call it tweet government by true social post. Very chaotic, very haphazard what he decides he wants to do at any given moment. And those two things often come into into into conflict. And so, you know, you have this specter of Trump saying one thing in a truth social post, saying another thing in a maybe a gaggle with reporters, and then Rubio or the chairman of the Joint Chiefs saying something else in a more formal process.

4:38And I think, you know, part of what is so unsettling for politicians in the U.S., but for certainly for politicians abroad, is how do we interpret all of that? Which part of those messages is actual U.S. policy? Which should we pay attention to? What should we follow? And I think, you know, we've learned the lesson over certainly the first Trump administration and now the first year of this administration, that usually at the end of the day, you listen to what Trump says. Well, I tell you what, I just want to play you a clip now of Oklahoma Senator Mark Wayne Mullen, when he is being asked about whether the U.S.

5:16is at war with Iran. You'll concede this is war. You'll concede this is war. We haven't declared war. They declared war on us.

5:26They've called it war. What I was saying, OK, well, that was a misspoke. But I was saying that they've declared war on us. But but war is ugly. It always has been ugly. But we're you know, we're at a we're taking out a regime that's been trying to attack us for quite some time. So it's war. It's not war. They attacked us. We attacked them. Hexeth saying they attacked us first. You think, oh, no, that's just absolutely not true. I mean, we know that the first missiles were fired by the Israelis and the Americans. Right. And if you go back to that first video statement that the president put out over the weekend, I guess on Saturday after the after the missiles started flying, he used the word war several times in that video.

6:10And I know there were a lot of eyebrows throughout Washington raised at that because normally presidents are more careful with their language to describe these sorts of things as conflicts or operations or some other euphemism that will at least give them the cover of not having to have gone to Congress to actually declare war. I'm actually old enough to remember the first Gulf War when President George Herbert Walker Bush took the country into war essentially to liberate Kuwait from Iraq. And there was a huge debate in Congress, an actual, honest to goodness, hours and hours and hours with members of Congress standing up and making their case for or against war.

6:52It hasn't happened since then. And I think there's no indication that this president or this Congress has any interest in doing this. So does that tell us that actually Donald Trump can just do what the hell he wants? I mean, yeah. And even the second Gulf War, you know, there was a UN resolution. There was the first UN resolution. Then there was debate. Tony Blair was trying to pressurise George W. Bush to go for a second resolution. George W. Bush says, no, we're going to go anyway. And Blair falls in alongside in 2003. In March, the invasion happens of Iraq. But now Trump hasn't certainly got down the UN route, hasn't sought congressional approval.

7:28Yeah, which is which which is totally in line with the overarching direction that the administration, this administration has taken towards essentially the balance of powers that we all grew up, you know, thinking about and reading about and studying the three branches of governments co-equal supposedly branches of government. And all presidents push against those limits. All presidents try to kind of, or at least I should say in modern times, most presidents have done that, have tried to acquire more power for the executive branch. But nothing like what this president has done, testing, pushing beyond the normal limits and trying to do things in violation of court orders without congressional approval or consultation.

8:13And I think the question is whether and when the other branches of government try to sort of push back. And obviously, the Supreme Court's limited. They don't have an enforcement capability to push back. Congress has some ability. Congress has some power, both in terms of their votes, in terms of their control of the purse. If members wanted to do that, they have some leverage over the executive branch. But obviously, most of them being sort of loyal to Trump, they don't want to do that. I suppose the other thing that is so striking is that, of course, this is Donald Trump who comes to power in 2016, having railed against the forever wars, having railed against the mistakes of Iraq and committing American troops to these faraway places of which we know little.

8:55And here we have Donald Trump at war with Iran. Right. You know, my colleague Peter Baker wrote a really, a really fine piece in The Times a few days ago, making that point exactly. And I think the thing that always makes me curious about this is the connection between Donald Trump and his base, the sort of 30 percent of the country who described themselves as part of the make America great Trumpy base, you would think that doing something like this would really upset that base because it feels like that was what they were desperate to avoid was these kinds of wars again. What we've seen is that with maybe the exception of the Epstein files, most of the things that Donald Trump does that we think would upset his base, they simply ignore.

9:45And it feels like that a little bit now. You've had a couple of members of Congress who are sort of MAGA members of Congress who have sort of made statements in opposition to what the president is doing in Iran. But most of his supporters seem perfectly happy with it, which is always boggling to me. Maybe I'm reading too much, but I have noticed that there have been pushback from some of the MAGA influencers. And, you know, Tucker Carlson. and well let's play you a clip of on the outer reaches of this which is alex jones and i'm watching it sync by its own doing and and so this is horrifying and and so but i can't sign on to covering up epstein i can't sign on to world war three and so that's why i tried to promote the optimism because i fucking need this man like i want to fix the country i want to turn it around.

10:34So it's not that I was delusional. I, and I still hope we can turn it around, but I just, sorry, go ahead. I just, you get what I'm saying. I get it. I get it. And I listen, like I said, I don't think that everybody that supported Trump was being, um, dismissive about these concerns. I get it. You know, we all wanted to believe I, I was, uh, 18 years old when Trump ran in 2016. And I remember getting in fights with people. I, You know, this is my whole life, too. At 18 years old, I wore the MAGA hat at Boston University, one of the most liberal campuses in the country, and became a pariah on my college campus.

11:12It's sad to see something you sacrificed. It's sad to see something you fought and bled for die. Yeah, and, you know, that's my whole adult life. I know that's a huge part of your life also. And now we're witnessing it's totally unraveling. It's an utter and complete betrayal. It's heartbreaking in many ways. And when I try to salvage it with people, I get attacked as a liberal. which is when these people doing that don't even can't even find iran on a fucking map i'm not sure there's many people out there that would call alex jones a liberal no i think very very very unlikely or nick fuentes for that matter yeah um you know it wasn't just that he was wearing a hat that made him a pariah frankly yeah but does trump worry that if you've got the opinion formers of the far right which trump was always happy to tickle when he was running are turning against him or feeling disillusioned that that spreads?

12:04I don't get the sense that Trump worries much. He's not very introspective in that way. But I think that there are probably smart people, smart politically people around him who are paying attention. I mean, Bannon was the kind of guy that when he was in the White House would pay attention to that kind of thing. How much was Trump feeding the base, the kinds of things that they needed in order to keep the support strong. But I also think they've seen again and again, this idea that they could, that he can sort of do what he wants and that there's a lot of, I don't know, what would be the economic term would be elasticity, right?

12:40Like the MAGA base, the sort of average MAGA voter out there seems really willing to follow him down whatever path he wants to go. Now, is there a place where that rubber band breaks? Maybe. And then maybe this is it. It sort of depends on how long it goes. Just you mentioned Steve Bannon there. I just wonder whether we could dwell on that for a second, because you also said a couple of minutes ago that the one thing that the base is not happy with is Epstein. And Steve Bannon appears a number of times in the Epstein files and kind of, you know, just because you've appeared in the files, there's no suggestion of wrongdoing or that you have committed, you know, terrible acts or whatever.

13:17But he is there prominently and he's obviously met with Epstein a number of times. Is Bannon, who I thought always when I was in Washington, was a brilliant political mind and a proper strategist. And, you know, you may not like what he stands for, but very, very clever indeed. Is Bannon diminished by this? By being in the Epstein? Sure. I mean, I think that the moment that we're in, anybody who is seen to be playing a significant appearance, not maybe somebody who's maybe mentioned once as an aside, but anybody that's got a significant appearance in the Epstein files has to understand now, if they don't, they're pretty thick headed, that the impact that that will have on their reputation.

14:01And that, you know, that is sort of across the board, whether you're a corporate CEO or a lawyer or Steve Bannon. I think a lot of these people like Steve are probably taking the long view that this too shall pass. And that assuming that there isn't evidence that comes out of actual wrongdoing, that, you know, that the world, the media, everybody will sort of move on to something eventually. But it's been it's had a lot of staying power. Yeah. So you say that, you know, for the most part, the base is still solid with him on Iran. At the State of the Union speech that he gave, was it only a week ago?

14:34Kind of, I mean, time just gallops by. it was very focused on the economy he didn't speak much about china he didn't speak it didn't talk at all about china mentioned iran in one kind of sentence saying you know you've got to be careful it was much more focused on the u.s economy if gas prices start to go up at the pumps because of all that's happening in iran and that seems possible inevitable if this goes on for weeks as donald trump has indicated it might that has an effect surely and republican lawmakers who are facing re-election in the midterms will start getting very anxious indeed. Absolutely.

15:10And I think that I'll betray how much of a tech nerd I am. Steve Jobs, the head of Apple, used to be accused of being able to have of having a reality distortion field that he would build around his products that would make people believe they're these spectacular products. And Trump has believes that he has the same thing, that it won't matter what the economy is actually doing, that he can simply say it's the best economy, the hottest economy, the world would love to have this economy, and everybody will believe him. And, you know, the power of the podium, the power of the presidency helps him achieve that.

15:48But there are limits. And I do think that what presidents have found throughout history, and I'm sure politicians in other countries as well, is that at some point, the pain that people are feeling, whether that's at the gas pump, whether that's at the supermarket, you can't talk that away. And I think you're right to point out the lawmakers. Those are the ones, those are the people that actually feel the consequences of that voter anger first. The midterms will, I still think that, you know, Republicans are probably going to do better than they are rumored to do. That's my gut feeling from thousands of miles away sitting here in London.

16:23But if it gets worse, if the economy gets worse and people are feeling that pain, Republicans will definitely have to answer for that. Do you think the Republicans will hold on to the House? Look, I'm not there every day. So it's just a gut feeling having been in Washington for 30 years. Like it feels to me, and this goes back to my, you know, answer about the MAGA base as well, it feels to me like there's a lot of doom and gloom among some of the Republicans. Oh, well, you know, Democrats are going to do better because of a lot of the anger that's out there in the country. And I think, you know, the history would show us that Trump tends to sort of Trump and his party tend to harness that anger and do better than people think.

16:59And I think also the Democrats are, you know, not as focused and organized. I mean, it happens after you lose power in the White House. So I don't know. That's my gut feeling is that the Republicans may well hold the House. You talk about being in London and it's now your job to report for The New York Times what is happening in this country. And of course, yesterday, we had Donald Trump in the White House with the most cutting insult. I think if you were to kind of try to devise what is the worst thing you could say about a serving prime minister of the United Kingdom, Donald Trump saying, well, it's not Winston Churchill we're dealing with.

17:36And I think especially in the middle of a war, especially it was, you know, right. I hit to the solar plexus. I was in the little huddle with the prime minister's spokesperson that they do after the prime minister answers questions once a week. And one of the other reporters, I didn't see who it was, yelled out the question, well, does the prime minister think Trump is no Roosevelt? And there was a wide smile on the spokesperson's face. And then he said, I think you'll appreciate that I won't answer that directly. But I mean, you know, obviously the Churchill thing is it hurts. It bites for sure.

18:11Does it matter? To Starmer? Does it matter? You think of, I mean, I was always asked to comment on the special relationship. And I'd say, look, in most things, it's just a myth. But there are areas of national security, intelligence sharing, defense cooperation, where it is real. I just wonder whether, you know, Trump falls in and out of favor with various different people. You know, Narendra Modi is one day the great mate, and then he's not. And, you know, you can see it. Yeah. I tend to think that even with Trump, who I think you can almost never, you know, underestimate what he will do. I mean, you see now he's threatening to cut off all trade with Spain.

18:49We'll see whether that, you know, whether that happens or whether it gets pulled back. You know, so you can't underestimate what he might do, but it feels different with the UK. It still feels like he has a soft spot in his heart for this country that he even the first kind of criticism, not the Churchill thing, but the criticism the night before when he was talking to reporters, it didn't feel as vicious as the normal Trump criticism when he really, truly doesn't like someone. And this feels like this feels like he has to chide Starmer and tweak Starmer for, you know, not playing ball. But I wouldn't be surprised if that relationship rebounds to where it was a couple of months ago or three months ago, four months ago.

19:35And I don't think from what we can tell anyway, that it's had much of an impact on the real engagement between the British Army and the U.S. Army and all of the intelligence services. All of that seems kind of impervious to that kind of thing. I mean, it was going to be symbolic anyway. I mean, what additional firepower are we going to give the Americans that they haven't already got? I mean, I don't want to run down our own military services who are brilliant. But I mean, what were we going to bring that the Americans haven't already got in theater? I found it cute. Maybe this is the wrong thing to say.

20:09I found it cute that the MOD, the Ministry of Defense, was making such a big deal about how they shot down one drone. they they they was their apparently the first drone that they had shot down from air to air from a thing and i thought well that's great for you guys that way to go but that's not bringing a lot of assets to the party does trump care about the international relationships i mean you've got to look you know like you you were there all through the first time and you know we all sat in there and kind of you know in the the pool sprays in the oval office or whatever it happened to be.

20:42I just don't know how much he cares realistically about it or whether, you know, having a foreign leader sitting next to him in the Oval is just a prop for him to be able to talk to the cameras and have a bit of a spat with Caitlin Collins and have a, you know, fight with this one or that one. He certainly doesn't care about the relationships in the way that we think about leader to leader relationships through history, where, you know, a typical leader of a country will seek to actually build a durable friendship and a durable kind of set of understandings with another country, both for the ability to work with that person in genuine ways and to advance the interests of both countries.

21:24I think what he likes is he likes being the big dog in the room. And so he wants to go to these events and have, quote unquote, relationships because he wants somebody to fawn over him. He wants somebody to, I mean, this is why he builds statues. He's building statues everywhere of himself. He's hanging, you know, pictures of his outside the Justice Department. And a colleague of mine, who's one of our best photographers, Doug Mills, did a piece online, where if you walk through the White House, I haven't been there in about a year. But if you walk through the White House, now all the rooms in the White House have portraits of Trump, like different kinds of portraits of Trump in, you know, one way or the other.

22:09But they're all over, which is not something, I mean, you know, most presidents do. So, you know, he so he wants those relationships as because he likes the adulation. And when the adulation doesn't come, then he's angry. So having been over here for a while now in London, are you surprised i was going to say how supine we are or maybe that's the wrong word but how deferential or fearful maybe fearful is the better word and is mark carney the model that perhaps other world leaders should aspire to it being just a bit tougher look i i see it both ways and maybe that's a weaselly answer but you know i understand the argument that akir starmer makes when he says look, you know, we have a whole set of things upon which we rely on the United States for, whether that's, you know, support for Ukraine, whether that's trade, whether that's, you know, military operations of the kind that we're, you know, engaging in now.

23:10And you can't simply say F you to the president of the United States and then expect the United States and especially a guy like Trump to then, you know, sort of come running when you need him for all of these other things. So I get that. But I also think that perhaps a more effective politician in Britain would have been able to find a way to kind of achieve that without seeming so kind of weak in the process. And I think that when you look at how politically damaged Keir Starmer is after 18 months in office, part of that, I think, is this perception of him as weak. Part of that's like domestically that he's flip-flopped on a lot of things.

23:53But part of it is this idea that, you know, regular people in this country don't get the sense that he has a backbone, that he's going to stand up for what he believes. And when he does, he kind of then backs down pretty soon afterwards. We'll be back in just a moment.

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