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The Briefing with Jen Psaki
Trump struck dumb as realities of war make a mockery of his bluster
00:42:19
Donald Trump has put a lot of energy into boasting about U.S. military dominance over Iran, including eliminating Iran's ability to shoot down planes. As is the case with so much of Trump's talk, reality has shown him to be ill-informed, lying, or both.
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Alex Wagner
well, over the past few weeks, we've heard a lot of bluster from the Trump administration about the war in Iran. We've heard a lot about how the United States is dominating Iran, how we've obliterated their military. Now we've already won the war. And amid all that bravado, there's been one specific boast that Trump and his allies have come back to over and over again. And that is the claim that the US has complete and total control over the airspace over Iran.
- [01:17]
Pete Hegseth
We're over the skies with the most beautiful planes you've ever seen roaming free. There's not a damn thing they can do about it.
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Alex Wagner
The two most powerful air forces in the world will have complete control of Iranian skies. Uncontested airspace.
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Pete Hegseth
They are roaming the skies over Tehran. They're not even being shot at because their equipment's been totally decimated. They have nothing to shoot.
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Colonel Amy McGrath
We expect to have complete and total
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Congressman Seth Moulton
dominance over Iranian airspace in the coming hours.
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Pete Hegseth
And we literally have planes flying over Tehran and other parts of their country. They can't do a thing about it. We're flying wherever we want, Pete. We have nobody even shooting at us.
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Alex Wagner
We're flying wherever we want, Pete. Nobody's even shooting at us. Well, it turns out that's not true. Today, Americans woke up to the news that Iran had shot down a US F15 fighter jet flying over Iranian airspace. Two crew members were ejected from the plane before it crashed inside Iran. American forces then proceeded to carry out a search and rescue operation inside Iran looking for the str stranded crew members. One of those crew members has been rescued. A search continues for the second crew member and that rescue mission has put more American service members in harm's way as they navigate Iranian territory in aircraft, as you can see here, that are slower moving and having to fly closer to the ground. The Washington Post cites multiple U.S. officials who say that two Black Hawk helicopters involved in the rescue operation were hit by Iranian fire, injuring US Personnel on board. Both aircraft were reportedly able to safely return to base. Now Ms. Now has matched reporting that a second plane involved in the rescue mission took fire and was damaged. The pilot of that plane was forced to eject over the Persian Gulf and was safely recovered. Meanwhile, the Iranian government is offering Iranian citizens a reward for the capture of the missing crew member. Needless to say, this entire situation is incredibly precarious and incredibly grave. But the president, who spent the last few weeks boasting about our control over Iranian airspace, seems almost unbothered by the whole thing. His first public comment didn't come until 3:20pm hours after the news broke, and it came in the form of a four word social media post. He said, quote, keep the oil, anyone? End quote. So American troops were in the middle of a rescue mission for a soldier stuck behind enemy lines, and Trump was casually musing about taking Iraq Iranian oil like someone at brunch ordering fries for the table. Oil, anyone? Trump then went on to give a series of short phone interviews in which he repeatedly brushed aside the implications of this crisis. He told NBC News that he didn't think any of this would affect his negotiations with Iran and complained about news coverage of the rescue operation. He was later asked by the Independent what he'd do if the missing crew member is captured or harmed by Iran. He told the outlet, well, I can't comment on it because we, we hope that's not gonna happen. And he ended the call shortly thereafter. Trump's flippant attitude about this very serious situation is galling, but it's completely consistent with the way that he's treated this entire war, which, incidentally, he's tried very hard to avoid calling a war because legally, he'd have to get congressional approval for a war. Ever since the day Trump launched this war from his Florida beach club wearing a trucker hat, he's treated it like a video game. His administration has released a series of highly offensive propaganda videos that they reportedly call banger memes. They spliced together real footage of American airstrikes with sports footage, with video game footage, even clips of SpongeBob SquarePants. And Trump has insisted on talking about the war like it's a golf trip or a weekend getaway. Repeatedly and purposefully calling it an excursion.
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Pete Hegseth
We took a little excursion because we felt we had to do that to get rid of some evil. A little bit of an excursion over the last two weeks. This is an excursion, a little excursion. But we're doing this excursion. We did an excursion. Do you know what an excursion is? When I went on this excursion, as I call it, excursion, excursion. You mind if I take a little excursion here?
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Alex Wagner
Just a little excursion. When talking about the war, Trump also regularly focuses on the parts of his administration, the parts of the war that his administration finds entertaining. Last month, when Talking about a U.S. strike on Iran's Kharg Island, Trump told NBC News, quote, We may hit it a few more times just for fun, end quote. He's repeatedly told this morbid story about sinking an Iranian ship for the same reason.
- [06:06]
Pete Hegseth
I was a little upset with Pete. I said, why didn't you save the ships? We could have used them, right? He said, it's more fun shooting them down. So why didn't you capture. We could have used them. They said it's more fun to put him at the bottom of the sea. And actually one of my generals said, sir, it's a lot more fun doing it this way. He said, it's more fun to sink him. He said, that's they like sinking them better.
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Alex Wagner
Every time this president describes a military operation, he sounds like a teenager playing with his Xbox. Here he was just last week describing how he felt watching the US Military intercepting Iranian missiles.
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Pete Hegseth
I watched their performance. Missiles launched, Missiles launched. You have to see it. It's very cool. Missiles launched. Missiles launched. Missiles launching. They're launching. Okay, we're ready. Fire.
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Congressman Seth Moulton
Boom.
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Pete Hegseth
Fire. Boom.
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Alex Wagner
I watched their performance. Fire. Boom. Fire. Boom. Now with an especially desperate situation. An American soldier desperately in need of rescue. With American men and women risking their lives in what might be the most dangerous operation of this war. The president's wartime attitude feels that much more outrageous. Donald Trump is incapable of grasping the gravity of this situation in which he has put our country as a matter of choice. This is a very serious situation that is being handled by very unserious people.
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Pete Hegseth
Their air force is gone. Their anti aircraft equipment is gone. We're flying wherever we want, Pete. We have nobody even shooting at us.
- [07:43]
Alex Wagner
Joining us now is msnow reporter David Noriega who's in Jerusalem tonight, longtime Pentagon correspondent, my old friend Barbara Starr, and the retired Lieutenant Colonel Amy McGrath. She was the first woman to fly a combat mission for the Marines and flew over 85 combat missions during her career. Welcome to all of you, thank you for being with us. Colonel McGrath, I want to start with you because there's just a seriousness about this. You flew aircraft when you were in Marines. I want you to just think about this airman, the one who's missing right now. What is that person trained to do in this situation? They're behind enemy lines. We don't know where they are. We don't know what condition they're in. Yeah.
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Colonel Amy McGrath
First let me say the war is not a video game. It's really real. And, you know, the aircrew, first of all, they are trained for this to happen. Every single flight that a combat mission that you go on, you brief this sort of scenario. And prior to that, you go through an entire school of how to train to make sure that you can evade and resist getting captured. So our air crew is very well trained for this. When you eject from an aircraft, that's a very violent thing to have happen. You may not survive the ejection. If you do, you might be injured, you may not be able to move. You have some devices on you that can communicate. They're encrypted. So you're trained to use those devices, but you may not want to use them, depending on where you're at. And so the tactics of how an air crew is going to evade right now I'm not going to go into, but because we're obviously an air crew is actively trying to do that right now. So I think that's really important for people to know. But we are trained and we have the best combat search and rescue capability on the planet. So if they can be found, we're going to find them.
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Alex Wagner
Barbara Starr, my old friend, it is great to see you again. You have covered every sort of instance like this that there has been in recent memory. I think, to Colonel McGrath's point, this isn't a video game. It would be helpful if we didn't continue to hear from the President and from Pete Hegseth about how it's a game, about how nobody's shooting at us, about how they've got no capabilities to do things. This is a war, and bad things happen in war.
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Barbara Starr
Inevitably they do. And maybe, just maybe, Pete Hegseth and Donald Trump are learning that lesson tonight to follow up on what Colonel McGrath was saying. And what I'm noticing tonight is we have someone down behind enemy lines. This person may have no food. They may be thirsty, bleeding, looking for water, very cognizant. Their families are aware that they are missing a loved one. Tonight, this is all important. This is something that US Forces are trained to deal with. But I think one of the key questions here tonight is the other side of the equation. How is it, with all the things that Trump and Hegseth have been saying, how is it that Iran still has this capability and is still successful in using it? Yes, you can always have a one off where your adversary is able to shoot at you and be successful. But I think a key question is what capabilities does Iran still have in its anti air capability? Is somebody helping them target? Are they learning new tactics about when to turn their radars on to try and locate US Warplanes overhead? What are they doing that is making them successful right now? That is something the Pentagon has got to figure out.
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Alex Wagner
And David, this is important because you're in Jerusalem where similar things are happening. Donald Trump is taking a page out of Benjamin Netanyahu's book here in terms of exaggerating things that happen, military activities that occur. It was very clear to all of us last June that the Israeli joint Israeli American attacks on Iran obliterated their nuclear capability. And suddenly we're at war with them to deal with their nuclear capability. Two days ago, Donald Trump said Americans will be fine with the high price of gas because we don't have the danger of someone. The words he used was throwing a nuclear weapon at us. There was zero threat of the of Iran throwing any sort of nuclear weapon at the United States.
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David Noriega
Yeah, Ali, you're right in saying that Donald Trump seems to be following Netanyahu's lead here or perhaps learning the wrong lessons from Netanyahu. Since I've been here, the military and political officials that I've spoken to have been similarly, let's say, ambiguous in describing the military goals of this campaign. They were unclear in saying whether or not it involved actually toppling the government of the Islamic Republic, which of course has not been achieved. Similarly in Lebanon describing the goal as defeating Hezbollah, which also has not been achieved. And then a perspective that I've heard repeatedly from mostly from Palestinians here in occupied East Jerusalem, but also from some Israelis that are critical of the Israeli government, is that we have seen this not just as you pointed out in the June war against Iran last year, which is most obvious, most recent precedent, but throughout Israel's history. I spoke a couple of days ago to a bookshop owner here in Jerusalem who from memory rattled off all of the wars that Israel has fought, beginning in 1948, then 56, then 67, 73, the wars in Lebanon beginning in 82, then into the 2000s, the endless on and off war in Gaza against Hamas beginning in the 2000s, which culminated, of course, after October 7th in what much of the international community describes as a genocide there. In all of those cases, this man pointed out, Israel resulted in a situation that was no safer than before, and we're seeing it again. Ali the achievements here have been overstated in Israel by Netanyahu and by other officials of his government and elected officials in the Knesset of his party and other parties in his ruling coalition. And there is again among a small minority of Israelis and definitely among most Palestinians, a growing sense that in a few months, or in, if they're lucky, a year or two, the people of Israel and Palestinians living in the occupied territories are once again going to find themselves in a situation where Israel is going to war for an objective that it claims to have achieved before. And what we're seeing now with these downed jets in Iran, the downed American jets, is a very vivid illustration of the same thing. As you've repeatedly pointed out, we were told over and over that the US had total control over Iranian airspace, and that very plainly has turned out not to be the case.
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Alex Wagner
ALI Colonel McGrath, I think Barbara makes a really good point that one may have degraded Iran's capabilities, anti aircraft capabilities to some degree, and something can always get through and the Iranians might get lucky, but it's hard to know, right? We're in a weird situation where we're not sure when the Pentagon tells us something whether to believe it. We're not sure when the President of the United States tells us something whether to believe it. We've got ourselves into a situation where we're waiting for confirmation from the Iranians, who we don't typically trust on this information anyway, to try and corroborate what the Americans are telling us from the point of view of the people who are asked to go out there and fight, the airmen and the sailors and the soldiers and the Marines who are out there. What does this do to morale when it's just not clear what we're doing there and what the end goal is?
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Colonel Amy McGrath
Yeah, you really wish that we had competent leadership right now. This is why you don't go out and you don't say reckless things like, hey, the Iranians can't do anything about it. We can fly our aircraft anywhere. We have complete control of the skies. Anybody that has been in war and has flown these types of missions knows that that is just not true. And when the President says that kind of thing, you know, those of us that have flown in these missions. We're sort of shaking our heads because we know it's not true. And so to say that just think about the fact that now the president somehow wants other nations and people to just sail through the Strait of Hormuz. Well, he says it's perfectly fine. And I mean, come on.
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Pete Hegseth
Says it should just have the guts to do it.
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Colonel Amy McGrath
Says one thing, it does another.
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Alex Wagner
Barbara, what do you make of the idea that Donald Trump on a daily basis either has told you that war is over, it's going to end soon, it's going to end within two weeks. It's going to be real easy, it's going to be done. We have a lot more to do. We've got to obliterate their nuclear powers. And there's been regime change. He's now suggesting they refer to this president of Iran who's exactly the same president of Iran who was there before this war started as a regime change president. Again, the messaging becomes very confusing. Wars diminish in popularity in America as they go on, but they sometimes can start with people supporting them because they understand the goal. We didn't start this war with people understanding the goal. And it literally, after that Oval Office speech, got less clear.
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Barbara Starr
Well, I personally give a lot of credit to the American people to understand what their politicians are saying and not saying. I think most Americans these days are very savvy on these points. And when you look at what. Let me just point to one thing the Pentagon says, and they mean it very candidly and heartfelt. The military, it briefs how many targets they hit. And I think the last time they briefed, they talked about they had hit 11,000 targets. Well, that to me sounds like a body count from the old days. And we know that body counts are not a sign of victory or success. Hitting targets doesn't make you successful. The Iranians in particular, and Americans are very aware of this work through proxies through Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis in Yemen, militant groups across Syria and Iraq. If you're not going to dismantle those terror networks and go after that leadership, you are still leaving a significant Iranian terror capability on the table. It is a good thing that their military is diminished. Nobody wants to see Iran be a military powerhous. But the difference between what the administration has achieved so far and any long term victory goal, there is a wide gulf between the two right now and not at all clear that the US Will pursue this to the end. And that may be the biggest problem of all. Ali, if the administration basically walks away from this declares victory and goes home. What becomes of our relationships with our allies in the region? Will US Troops ever go back to the Gulf states, to their bases there? What happens with that security framework that the US has in the Middle East? And you can readily see that go on to the US Relationship with countries like Russia and China.
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Alex Wagner
David, it wasn't that long ago you were in Venezuela and we were having a similar conversation, right, where there was this diaspora of Venezuelans around the world and in America who were very supportive of taking out the Venezuelan regime. Turns out the Venezuelan regime was not taken out and it's business as usual, except that we've got access to their oil. This becomes complicated. Donald Trump said to NBC News tonight that whatever happens here, including the shooting down of this plane, will not affect negotiations. But the Iranians don't seem to be engaging in negotiations with the United States. So once again, Donald Trump says he'll feel it in his bones when this war is over. He says it might be a couple of weeks, but there's actually no roadmap toward an end of this war.
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David Noriega
Well, no. And the Iranians have repeatedly said that they don't consider the United States and Israel good faith interlocutors in any kind of negotiations, the reason for which is obvious. There were two consecutive times in which Iran was bombarded by the United States and Israel while in the middle of negotiations with those parties over the very issues that those parties claimed were the cause for the war, the nuclear program and the ballistic missile program. And Ali, I mean, the Venezuela parallel is incredibly instructive because Donald Trump has said repeatedly that he wanted this operation to be like Venezuela in the sense that it came at virtually no cost to the U.S. armed forces or the American people. But obviously, we're seeing that this is an extremely different situation in a way that is massively high stakes, not just for the president, but for the U.S. armed forces. And last point I'll make on the diaspora point, Ali, I mean, yes, I spoke to a number of extremely disappointed Venezuelans abroad who hoped that the military incursion for years would result in toppling the Maudo regime. It did not. There is similarly a large Iranian diaspora that is now coming to terms with the reality of war, a war that in many cases they called for.
- [20:46]
Alex Wagner
Let us hope that we get good news about this missing pilot. Let us hope that we don't have to talk about things like this many times again. But I am grateful to all of you for being with us tonight. David Noriego for us in Jerusalem. Barbara Starr, my old friend and Colonel Amy McGrath. Thank you all for being here tonight. Well, coming up, we're going to show you the video that the White House really doesn't want you to see right now and tell you about the people close to Trump who might be getting rich off of this war. Congressman Seth Moulton standing by. He joins us next.
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Alex Wagner
All right. This week the White House posted a video of Donald Trump online before quickly deleting it. Now, I want to note before we play it that the White House press secretary Caroline Levitt said that the left wing media has been dishonestly making taking Trump's comments in this video out of context. Let's listen.
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Pete Hegseth
We can't take care of daycare. We're a big country. We have 50 states. We have all these other people. We're fighting wars. We can't take care of daycare. It's not possible for us to take care of daycare. Medicaid, Medicare, all these individual things. We have to take care of one thing, military protection.
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Alex Wagner
So yesterday, the White House was adamant that those comments were taken out of context. Not quite sure what context would help here, but today the White House published its budget proposal. Now, the thing you have to know about a government is they can say all the things they want, but the budget is where the priorities of the government actually come in. And the budget shows that. Those comments we just played for you were absolutely not taken out of context. Trump is calling on Congress to increase the military's budget by more than 40%. 4 0. He wants $1.5 trillion of your taxes for the military. He wants to dramatically cut domestic social services to square that bill. That'll sound familiar to many of you, but at the same time, Trump is saying that the government can't afford to support American families, saying that he needs all that money for his war. This is the peace president who didn't want to get us into wars. And here's the thing. Trump's own family seems to be cashing in on the war. Weeks ago, the New York Times reported that Trump's son in law was asking Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states for billions of dollars in new investments while simultaneously acting as one of America's top negotiators in the region. He says he's a government volunteer. But he and Steve Witkoff are apparently central to this whole negotiation with Iran. Kushner's investment firm, Affinity Partners, insists that it is following the law. And the White House said Kushner is only acting in the best interest of the American public. I feel better now. But now we have new reporting showing that it isn't just Jared Kushner that might be profiting off of this war. Last night, the Associated Press reported that a drone company backed by Trump's adult sons, Eric and Don Jr. Is actively trying to sell their drones to Gulf countries that are under attack from Iran, countries that need the support of the military, of which Eric and Don Jr. S dad just so happens to be the commander in chief. The Trump Organization has dismissed claims that there's a conflict of interest here, as has the drone company. Trump is asking Americans to tighten their belts, to shell out for this war. He's asking Americans to risk their lives and the lives of their family members, all while his family appears to be getting rich off of this war. Joining me now is Congressman Seth Moulton. He's a Marine veteran and a member of the House Armed Services Committee. Congressman, thank you for being with us. I do want to ask you, as a member of the House Armed Services Committee, have you been briefed about this fighter pilot who is missing at the moment?
- [27:19]
Marine Veteran Guest
I have not been briefed yet. The briefings from this administration tend to come well after the fact, when they can spin the facts into. Into a nice package and make it all sound jolly and happy for all those of us in Congress, and there's not really any real oversight being conducted.
- [27:36]
Alex Wagner
It's a serious matter, though, because Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth have been carrying on for weeks about how we've got complete control of the skies over Tehran. I mean, it's not just saying it in a military way. They're talking about the fact that the planes can go anywhere, go where they want, nobody can actually hit us, and then a plane gets hit. I understand this is war. Bad things happen. But it does not seem like these folks in the White House or in the Defense Department are able to deliver the seriousness with which we need this treated.
- [28:05]
Marine Veteran Guest
Absolutely not. And let's go straight to the commander in Chief who just 24 hours before, in his speech to the nation, told everyone in America and the world that we've taken out all of Iran's anti aircraft capability. A day later, a plane shot down. Two other planes hit as well. This is a commander in chief who absolutely cannot be trusted. And I'll tell you As a Marine who was on the ground in the Middle east fighting a war that many of us had disagreements with.
- [28:33]
Alex Wagner
Yep.
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Marine Veteran Guest
At least we felt like our commanders were telling the truth. Even if we didn't agree with the tactics or the strategy, we at least felt like our commanders were telling the truth. No American fighting in the Middle east today can honestly believe that their commander in Leith, in truth, that their commander in chief even is telling the truth about what's going on.
- [28:53]
Alex Wagner
Let's talk. The most truthful thing that's happened might be this budget proposal, because they're actually saying the quiet part out loud. You can't lie about the budget. When you say this is the money you want to spend on something, and when you say, like Donald Trump did, that this is the money we're not going to spend on, I mean, his argument about how we're 50 states, we're a big country, we can't afford daycare. OECD countries, developed countries all over the world manage to pay for daycare. It doesn't matter that you're a big country or a small country. But he's being very clear. Daycare, Medicare, Medicaid, these are not government priorities. He's been very, very clear about what the government's priorities are.
- [29:28]
Marine Veteran Guest
That's right. And you know, there's been a lot of backlash to this comment that he made because it is spot on. It is revealing the truth. And I mean, maybe we should be looking on poly markets to see what their bets are that the Trump family invests in daycare facilities, and then suddenly the President decides that maybe we will put some money there. The bottom line is that the Trump family is profiting off almost every decision, every statement this president makes. And the war profiteering going off right now, bets on whether this pilot will be found and who will find him. It's just extraordinarily corrupt at levels we've never seen before. And it goes right back to the president and his family.
- [30:09]
Alex Wagner
Yeah, Kalshee has said they won't get involved in bets on death and war. But you did point out that a prediction market that Don Jr. Is involved in did seem to be hosting a bet. They've since taken it down on literally when or if the fighter pilot would be rescued. Now, that's gross on every level, but it's grosser when you have potential, when you're adjacent to information that the public's not adjacent to.
- [30:35]
Marine Veteran Guest
I mean, look, at the end of the day, I'm going to be shocked if Don Jr. Himself is not the one making these bets and profiting off them, because it's clearly someone who has incredible inside information. This happened with the capture of Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela. It's happened off of things like the Nobel Peace Prize. I mean, it's extraordinary how much people are profiting off this war. Profiteers. And, you know, so when I called out that bet online and the poly markets responded and said, oh, you know, sorry, this violates our ethical standards. And so we took it down. It turns out that it doesn't even violate their standards. They're just making up that story that they have standards in place because it was embarrassing to them. And there are hundreds of war bets still online right now. So what needs to happen is the government needs to actually exercise the regulatory authority it already has. The CFTC can regulate these markets. That's obviously not in the interest of the administration because it's profiting off these bets.
- [31:40]
Alex Wagner
If only this were the only story about somebody profiting off of these wars. But there are so many. There's Jared Kushner, there's Elon Musk, who's got some interest in this whole thing going on. It's a lot. Congressman, good to have you here tonight. Thank you for being with us.
- [31:56]
Marine Veteran Guest
Good to see you.
- [31:57]
Alex Wagner
Congressman Seth Moulton is a member of the House Armed Services Committee and he's a Marine Corps veteran. All right, coming up, Donald Trump announces J.D. vance has a new job hunting for frog. I got a few ideas about where you might find it. That's next. Remember, a little over a month ago, Donald Trump delivered a long winded light on substance State of the Union address. And one of the few policy announcements Trump made was his war on fraud, which would be led by Vice President J.D. vance. Well, today, in a true social post, Trump officially named Vance the administration's fraud czar, who's gonna focus on fraud everywhere. And by everywhere, Trump then clarified that he meant primarily in blue states. Of course, so far, Trump's self declared war on fraud has been less about actually combating fraud and more about doling out punishment to groups like the Somali American community, which Trump has repeatedly disparaged in incredibly racist ways. And the real irony here is that the Trump administration is so dead set on targeting and scapegoating immigrants that they're letting actual fraudsters off the hook. This week, ProPublica reported that to free up manpower to focus on immigrants, the Trump administration has been dropping cases against actual alleged fraudsters by the hundreds. They shut down more than 100 health care fraud cases and more than 900 cases where someone tried to defraud federal government programs. They dropped all of those cases in just the first six months of Donald Trump's second term. I wonder if Donald Trump's new frauds are can look into that. And then there's the indisputable and damning fact that Trump has granted clemency to dozens of allies, donors and others convicted of fraud. In just one case, Donald Trump pardoned the owner of a nursing home empire convicted of a massive $39 million fraud scheme. Trump pardoned him three months into a three year sentence. And in a new piece in the New Republic, the Democratic Congresswoman, Madeline Dean says that Trump's corrupt may well be the most corrupt thing about him that's saying something. Joining me now is the Democratic Congresswoman, Madeline Dean of Pennsylvania. Congresswoman, thank you for joining us. There's a lot to choose from when it comes to the corruption of this president. Tell me how you arrived at the idea that the pardons are at the top of the list.
- [34:24]
Congressman Seth Moulton
Well, I had a scholar's help, somebody who has studied Congress and the Constitution and different administrations over many decades. That's Norm Ornstein. So he and I got together and he knew that I had been there on January 6th. He knew that I saw that the Capitol was overrun by insurrectionists incited by a president, invited by a president, and ultimately not interrupted by a president for 187 minutes. And then disgustingly, on his first day back in office, January of last year, pardoned by a president. So Norm and I together decided. It's hard to choose, you have to admit, because I have other horrors within my mind. The drug pardons are beyond belief in terms of drug trafficking, as this president claims. He cares so much about fentanyl coming into this country and killing our young people. But let's take a look at January 20th. The President sworn back in. And on the first day, he pardons more than 1500 insurrectionists. That is, to me, it was massively heartbreaking for this country, for our Constitution, for our capital, for the people who were at risk there, including his own vice president, for all of our staff. And I think so much, I have to tell you, I think so much of the staff who after this disastrous, dangerous insurrection, cleaned up the mess, they stood up and they did their duty far greater than this president ever did.
- [36:11]
Alex Wagner
I'm curious about Donald Trump's self described war on fraud. He brought it up at the State of the Union. He's decided J.D. vance is in charge of it. Just days after, after that announcement, this is what JD Vance had to say about it. Let's listen. When you go to the polls in November, I don't want you to just think about all the great things that we've accomplished, all the great things that we've talked about. I don't want you just to think about no taxes on tips and lower gas prices. I want you to think, who is going to protect my money from fraudsters? That's awful rich.
- [36:46]
Congressman Seth Moulton
Have you seen the price of gas?
- [36:48]
Alex Wagner
Yeah.
- [36:48]
Congressman Seth Moulton
Have you seen the lower gas prices?
- [36:50]
Alex Wagner
Yeah.
- [36:50]
Congressman Seth Moulton
In Montgomery County. You know Montgomery County?
- [36:53]
Alex Wagner
Yep.
- [36:53]
Congressman Seth Moulton
419 today. $4.19 a gallon. It's up every single day. And that's just gas, which is critically important to my constituents. But diesel fuel is up. That means every single thing that we buy is up. Utilities are up. Housing is up. Inflation is up. The jobs, as weird as the numbers were today, you saw the grotesque losses of February. 178,000 jobs lost in February. This president was hired to do two things, improve the economy, make things more affordable, and keep us safe and at peace. He has failed grotesquely at both. And I have to tell you, Ali, his speech the other night from the White House was so disheartening and so troubling to me. I'm a member of Congress, and of course I know he should have come to Congress when he went into this war of his own making in Iran, putting our service members at risk. More than 50,000 members of our service at risk. 13 dead, one missing right now. Thank God they have found the one fighter pilot and please God, they find the other and they both survive and get home to their families and thank them for their service. But so many are at risk. This is a war of the president's choice. And the president doesn't seem to understand at all what he has done here. He has made the world less safe. The Strait of Hormuz. How silly of him not to have understood that that was at critical risk. The price of oil. How silly of him. How unserious of him and the secretary of Defense not to have understood this. Not our military. Our military understand exquisitely the risks. They are so superbly trained. And thank God for them, and I pray for them every single night. But this president has proved himself to be irrational, incoherent, just bouncing back and forth. I've said long ago he's unhinged and unwell, and that makes us at grave risk when we're at war.
- [39:15]
Alex Wagner
You and Normcy and I are going to continue this conversation because you're proposing a constitutional amendment or at least Some, some version of making the pardon power a little more constrained. We'll talk about that later this weekend. Always great to talk to you. Thank you for joining us. Congresswoman Madeline Dean, Democratic of Pennsylvania. All right, coming up, Donald Trump just said something about the war with Iran that shows how detached he really is. That's next. One must imagine that Donald Trump is desperately trying to find an off ramp to end this war with Iran. But that desire is butting up against harsh reality because not only does Iran now have a say in, in when and how this war ends, but so do our allies across the Middle east, namely Israel and Saudi Arabia, who, according to multiple reports, are both pushing to keep this fighting going. But Trump is confident that Israel will do just as he tells them. They'll stop when I stop, he told Time magazine they'll stop unless they're provoked, in which case they'll have no choice. It's an interesting caveat given how Israel is currently fighting not one but two fronts in this war. The first, of course, being in Iran, the other in Lebanon against the Iranian backed militia known as Hezbollah. By and large, that conflict, the one inside Lebanon, has received far less attention here in the United States, but it doesn't make it any less urgent. Joining me now is someone with firsthand knowledge of how this conflict is not only affecting Lebanon, but also the broader region. David Miliband is the former UK Foreign Secretary. He's the president and CEO of the International Rescue Committee. David, great to see you. Thank you for being with us. You're just back from Lebanon?
- [40:55]
David Miliband
I was in bed with Beirut on Wednesday. I was in Damascus and Homs in Syria on Monday, Tuesday. So I'm just back from the region. And it's so important to understand this is not just an Iran conflict. Yes, it's consuming. There are 20 countries between Afghanistan and Pakistan in South Asia, Sudan In North Africa, 20 countries in between. They're all affected. They're all affected. And the fragile ones like Lebanon and Syria, they had a good 2025. They're really in danger of getting sucked into that vortex of conflict and instability in 2026.
- [41:26]
Alex Wagner
So there's conflict, instability. There's a third issue that has to do with the Strait of Hormuz and that is that a lot of countries in the region get not just their fuel, but their fertilizer and other products from there. So this, you and I have been discussing famine in Sudan and other places. All of that gets worsened. Forget about instability and forget about the incursion of Israel into southern Lebanon. There's just a great deal of food instability.
- [41:48]
David Miliband
Well, not just in the region. The Council on Foreign Relations calls this war and the closure of the Straits of Hormuz a slow motion famine. The reason they say that 30% of the world's fertilizer goes through the Straits for Hormuz, I say goes. I should say doesn't go. Doesn't go, yeah, because it's not going at the moment. And this is now the planting season. The next six weeks are absolutely critical. Across Africa, across Asia, farmers desperate to get the fertilizer on the ground because if they don't, there's a time bomb primed to explode in June. That's the danger. So in Lebanon, where I was a million people displaced, that's an emergency. But you're absolutely right, there's the indirect effect of this conflict as well.
- [42:32]
Alex Wagner
So could you talk about 2025 for Lebanon and Syria? Syria weirdly and unexpectedly got a little bit more stable. Lebanon has had stability problems for a long time. It's a complicated story which you know well in both of your jobs, your current job and your prior job, the government of Lebanon, the elected government of Lebanon does not control the whole country. Hezbollah does enjoy political power in Lebanon and they are constantly in skirmishes with Israel. But what has happened here in southern Lebanon is under the shadow and fog of this war. Israel has kind of just taken over.
- [43:08]
David Miliband
Well, Lebanon's tragedy is always to be the victim of other people's wars. And Hezbollah fired into Israel to mark the killing of the Iranian Supreme Leader on 28 February. Many, many Lebanese of all denominations are furious about the fact they were dragged into the war. But they're also furious now because Israel has retaliated in such a way that a million people have been driven from their homes. That is 20% of the population. Just think about the numbers. One in five Lebanese driven from their homes. Only about 150,000 are in a shelter. And a shelter by the way, means a school. I visited them on Wednesday, the vast majority of them on the floor of relatives, friends, a few of them still intense in what was pretty cold weather, very windy, a lot of rain at the beginning of the week on the Cornish in Beirut, it's very weird. You've got the Beirut Yacht Club and then there are tents outside. And so Lebanon situation, you mentioned 2025. They got a credible government in 2025. It was offering a new political settlement for the country. The danger is that that is snatched away from them.
- [44:18]
Alex Wagner
Now you've seen what happens. I mean, we think about it as famine or we think about it as instability. But fundamentally the political problems of the world stem from these regional instabilities that are impossible to solve once they get started. Right. The whole everything you see in Europe about these right wing movements stems from the fact that they were unable to deal with the refugees flow in large part coming from Syria after the Syrian civil war. These are real problems. Once you start displacing people from their homes, this is a decades long problem.
- [44:48]
David Miliband
I agree with you, except with one point. There's no such thing as regional instability.
- [44:54]
Alex Wagner
Right.
- [44:55]
David Miliband
What starts in one region doesn't stop in that region. The war in Iran is not going to stop in the Middle East. The war in Sudan doesn't stop in North Africa. This is now a hyper connected world and its risks are connected. Not just benefits are unequally distributed and its risks are distributed all over, whether it be health risks, whether it be nuclear risks, whether it be refugee flows that you mentioned. And it's the all of us suffer. We're all paying higher gas prices. Actually I don't have a car, but those who have a car in New York, you don't have a car but
- [45:25]
Alex Wagner
you're paying for it because your grocers are more expensive.
- [45:27]
David Miliband
Everything's more expensive. But it's the most vulnerable who are going to be on the edge. And it's them who I'm very, very worried about because we know when they're hitting political instability follows.
- [45:37]
Alex Wagner
Yeah, you've always got to tell the stories of those whose stories are not told. And we really respect you for that. Thank you so much.
- [45:42]
David Miliband
Thank you, Alex.
- [45:43]
Alex Wagner
David, as always, David Miliband is the president and the CEO of the International Rescue Committee. We'll be right back. All right, that's gonna do it for me tonight.
- [45:53]
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- [46:17]
Congressman Seth Moulton
Com.
- [46:20]
Commercial Narrator
Now back to your regularly scheduled listening.