by Steve Benen | May 6, 2026 | Iran Tensions, Maddowblog, News, Politics
Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke to reporters Tuesday from the White House briefing room, apparently with a single goal in mind: talk up the administration’s new policy in the Strait of Hormuz.
Asked, for example, about whether the United States would have to acquire all Iranian nuclear material in order to end the war, Rubio suggested that the war had already come to an end.
“The operation is over,” the secretary claimed. “Epic Fury, as the president notified Congress, we’re done with that stage of it, OK? We’re now on to this Project Freedom.”
Hours earlier, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, held a briefing at the Pentagon and stressed the same point. Hegseth referred to “Project Freedom” in his first sentence and mentioned it another 10 times over the course of the briefing, insisting that it is “separate and distinct” from the 10-week-old war. For his part, Caine referred to “Project Freedom” a half-dozen additional times.
The point was not subtle: The Trump administration’s line du jour was to argue that the war that began on Feb. 28 has, for all intents and purposes, run its course. The new priority was a maritime security initiative involving U.S. ships escorting other ships through the strait. To hear Rubio and Hegseth tell it, anyone focusing on the war was behind the times. All that matters now, they argued, was Project Freedom.
A couple of hours after Rubio wrapped up his Q&A at the White House, Donald Trump put the “project” on ice. MS NOW reported as part of its live blog coverage:
Trump announced the U.S.
by Steve Benen | May 5, 2026 | Iran Tensions, Maddowblog, News, Politics
As the war in Iran got underway, Donald Trump’s strategy for the conflict was, among other things, shrouded in mysteries that shouldn’t have existed. Americans were left in the dark about why the United States went to war, whether the combat operations actually constituted a war, whether the war was legal, how much the war would cost, how long the war would last and whether the administration had a credible plan to achieve its vague objectives.
Two months later, the White House’s policy is still shrouded in mysteries that shouldn’t exist, but the list is evolving.
For example, as this week got underway, Iran reportedly mounted a missile-and-drone attack on commercial ships that U.S. forces were protecting in the Strait of Hormuz, while also targeting American warships. Soon after, the U.S. military said it sank six Iranian boats. Does that mean the ceasefire is over? As MS NOW reported in its live blog, the American president didn’t want to talk about it on Monday:
Trump declined to say whether the fragile ceasefire with Iran remains in effect, offering little clarity as tensions continue to escalate, in an interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt.
Asked by Hewitt if the ceasefire was over, Trump replied, “Well, I can’t tell you that.”
So, on the one hand, we saw U.S. and Iranian forces trading shots, while Trump threatened anew to blow Iran “off the face of the Earth.” On the other hand, the American president who claims to have “terminated” combat operations would prefer not to tell the public whether the ceasefire remains intact or not.
There are secrets surrounding any war, but this need not be one
by Steve Benen | May 1, 2026 | Iran Tensions, Maddowblog, News, Politics
For reasons that have never been explained, Donald Trump decided months ago that Steve Witkoff would serve as the administration’s top negotiator with Iran. If his name sounds familiar, that’s because Witkoff is also helping lead the administration’s negotiations with Russia and Ukraine, despite the inconvenient fact that Witkoff is a New York real estate developer with no relevant experience in foreign policy or delicate international diplomacy.
Nevertheless, the White House’s top amateur diplomat has, in fact, met with Iranian officials, including interactions last year that long predated the president’s decision to launch an unnecessary war. According to Witkoff’s own public comments, in one of the discussions he talked about developing a “verification” system that might allow Iran to produce low levels of uranium for a nuclear energy program.
That wasn’t an outrageous position to take. In fact, Witkoff’s position dovetailed with elements of the Obama-era nuclear agreement, which did roughly the same thing.
On Thursday Trump spoke with Newsmax’s Greta Van Susteren, who told the president as part of the on-air interview that Witkoff told her that the United States offered Iranian officials a possible agreement in which they could enrich uranium for a domestic medical program, below levels needed for a nuclear weapon.
The president, who too often seems like a bystander in his own White House, apparently wasn’t aware of the offer — and immediately denounced it.
VAN SUSTEREN: Witkoff told me the US offered Iran enriched uranium for medical purposes, free, if they’d give up their nuclear programTRUMP: Well, I wouldn’t have approved that. I’m not giving them anything— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2026-04-30T20:16:08.507Z
“Maybe it wasn’t a very serious offer because I
by Steve Benen | Apr 10, 2026 | Iran Tensions, Maddowblog, News, Politics
A couple of weeks ago, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy declared publicly that his country’s government had “irrefutable” evidence that Russia had provided intelligence to the Iranian regime.
This week, he vented his frustration over the White House’s indifference. The Guardian reported:
Speaking in an interview with Alastair Campbell on The Rest is Politics podcast, Zelenskyy said he had tried to draw the White House’s attention to the close collaboration between Moscow and Tehran.
He said Russian military satellites had photographed critical energy infrastructure objects in the Gulf states and in Israel, as well as the locations of US army bases across the region. The Kremlin passed details and images to the Iranian regime, he said, to facilitate its attacks.
“I said this publicly. Did we hear a reaction from the U.S. to Russia that they have to stop it?” Zelenskyy asked rhetorically. He added, “The problem is they trust Putin. And it’s a pity.”
His frustration was understandable. Just days into the war with Iran, multiple news organizations, including MS NOW, reported that Russia had provided Iran with information that could help it strike American targets. One U.S. official told MS NOW point-blank, “Russia is providing intelligence help to Iran.”
While some skepticism might’ve been understandable, it wasn’t long before lingering doubts about the accuracy of the reporting evaporated. Iranian officials have publicly confirmed Russia’s “military cooperation”; U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz acknowledged Russia’s wartime “strategic partnership” with Iran; and Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff of California, a former chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said matter-of-factly that Russia “is providing intelligence to Iran to better attack and kill American troops.”
The Wall Street Journal
by Steve Benen | Apr 10, 2026 | Iran Tensions, Maddowblog, News, Politics
For U.S. service members, one day from the war with Iran stands out: On March 1, the second day of the military offensive, an unmanned Iranian drone struck a “tactical operations center” in Port Shuaiba, Kuwait, killing six U.S. soldiers and wounding many others.
Donald Trump’s response to the deadly developments sparked a controversy; the president posted a prerecorded video to social media, in which he said, among other things, “Before it ends, that’s the way it is. Likely be more.”
But Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s response was considerably worse.
Two days before he pressed news organizations to downplay the significance of fallen U.S. troops, the beleaguered Pentagon chief told reporters, in reference to the Iranian drone, “Every once in a while, you might have a squirter that makes its way through.”
In other words, according to Hegseth, defenses were in place to protect the U.S. military outpost in Kuwait, but one unmanned drone managed to sneak through and do deadly harm.
That version of events is now facing important pushback from sources in a position to know. MS NOW reported, as part of the network’s liveblog coverage:
The White House did not address the account Thursday of survivors of the Iranian attack on a U.S. military outpost in Kuwait who pushed back against the Pentagon’s characterization of the incident. Six U.S. service members were killed in the strike during the early days of the war.
In an interview with CBS News, one soldier injured in the attack on the Port of Shuaiba called Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s description of the incident as merely one drone that ‘squeaked through’ a ‘falsehood.’
One of the injured soldiers, speaking on
by Steve Benen | Apr 9, 2026 | Congress, Iran Tensions, Maddowblog, News, Politics
Roughly 40 days after the U.S. war in Iran began, the Republican-led Congress still hasn’t held a single hearing about the deadly and costly military offensive. Common sense might suggest that lawmakers might at least want to ask some questions — about the war, its merits, its cost, its objectives, the way in which it’s been executed, etc. — but to date, the grand total of public hearings remains at zero, despite Democratic appeals for Congress to do its job.
It’s emblematic of a larger problem: Against a backdrop of war, GOP lawmakers are embracing their own irrelevance.
On Wednesday, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries sent a letter to colleagues, which read in part, “A two-week ceasefire is woefully insufficient. Accordingly, we have demanded that the House come back into session immediately in order to vote on our resolution to permanently end the war in the Middle East.” Those demands have gone ignored.
The New York Democrat also made related plans to attempt passage of a War Powers Resolution during a pro forma session on Thursday, as part of an effort to limit the president’s authority to continue military operations in Iran without explicit congressional approval.
Those efforts are all but certain to fail, but they are born of desperation: Democratic leaders and the vast majority of their members want to do something — to exert congressional authority, to limit Trump’s powers, or preferably both — even as Republicans agree to leave questions over war and peace in the hands of a scandal-plagued and unpopular president who doesn’t appear to have any idea what he’s doing.
The New York Times highlighted GOP leaders’ scandalous indifference:
The
