by Steve Benen | Apr 7, 2026 | Iran Tensions, Maddowblog, News, Politics
It’s not exactly a secret that most Americans oppose the U.S. war in Iran. Donald Trump tends to claim that polls that fail to tell him what he wants to hear are part of an elaborate media conspiracy that only he understands, but in this case even he seems to realize that the military offensive he ordered is not popular.
When a reporter asked Monday, “What do you say to Americans who are not a fan of the war?” the Republican president replied, “They’re foolish, because the war is about one thing: Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon.”
Speaking of foolishness, Trump’s comment didn’t make a lot of sense. For one thing, it’s generally not a good idea for a president to scold his fellow Americans. For another, given that Iran does not have, has never had and was not close to building a nuclear weapon, his latest rationale for the deadly conflict fell far short of coherence.
But as it turned out, this wasn’t his only complaint about public attitudes in the country he ostensibly leads. Politico reported:
President Donald Trump on Monday said he would like to ‘take’ Iran’s oil — but that he hasn’t because Americans want to see the war brought to a close.
‘If I had my choice, I’d keep the oil. But I also want to make the people of our country happy,’ Trump told reporters at the annual White House Easter egg roll.
As part of the same exchange, the president said: “Unfortunately, the American people would like to see us come home. If it were up to me, I’d take the oil, I’d keep the oil, it would
by Steve Benen | Apr 7, 2026 | Congress, Maddowblog, News, Politics
There was a curious moment during Monday’s White House press conference when Donald Trump reflected on Pete Hegseth’s Senate confirmation process, which led to the closest confirmation vote in American history for a defense secretary.
“He was treated very unfairly,” the president said, misremembering the events of early 2025, “and now those same people that treated him unfairly, that fought against him, they call me up saying what a great choice he was.”
Trump, of course, has established a record of sharing the details of conversations that occurred only in his imagination, and there’s every reason to believe this was an example of the phenomenon. Indeed, Hegseth has been such a disaster at the Pentagon that it’s simply implausible to think that there are senators who opposed the former Fox News host last year and have come to conclude this year that he was a “great choice.”
But right around the same time that the president was making these odd comments, efforts were underway on Capitol Hill related to the beleaguered defense secretary. NBC News reported:
Rep. Yassamin Ansari, D-Ariz., announced today that she intends to introduce impeachment articles against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. Ansari cited the Iran war and said Hegseth had ‘repeatedly’ violated his oath of office and his duty to the Constitution.
“Only Congress has the power to declare war, not a rogue president or his lackeys,” the Arizona Democrat said in a written statement. “Hegseth’s reckless endangerment of U.S. servicemembers and repeated war crimes, including bombing a girls’ school in Minab, Iran, and willfully targeting civilian infrastructure, are grounds for impeachment and removal from office.”
This will be the second such effort,
by Steve Benen | Apr 7, 2026 | Iran Tensions, Maddowblog, News, Politics
After months of rhetoric about possible war crimes in Iran, Donald Trump upped the ante on Sunday morning, publishing an unhinged threat to his social media platform in which the president explicitly vowed to target Iranian power plants and bridges. As Easter Sunday progressed, he did brief interviews with several media outlets to echo that point.
The New York Times reported soon after that, according to legal experts, historians and former U.S. officials, “No other recent American president has talked so openly about committing potential war crimes.”
A day later, Trump fielded questions from reporters — first at a White House Easter Egg Roll event, then at a White House press conference — who pressed the Republican on his willingness to target Iranian infrastructure, in defiance of international law.
It didn’t go well.
The president, who must’ve realized he’d face these questions and had plenty of time to huddle with his aides and prepare coherent answers, peddled three distinct responses to the line of inquiry.
1. Refuse to talk about his plans for possible war crimes. MS NOW’s Lindsey Pipia asked, “Are you committed to committing a war crime in this war with Iran?” Trump heard the question but refused to answer it. “What else?” he said to no one in particular, as if the question wasn’t worth his time or consideration.
Q: Are you committing a war crime?TRUMP: *refuses to answer* What else?— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2026-04-06T15:42:40.701Z
2. Change the definition of “war crime.” As part of a separate exchange, Trump was asked whether he considered hitting civilian infrastructure to be a war crime. “You know what’s a war crime?” he responded. “Having a nuclear weapon,
by Steve Benen | Apr 7, 2026 | Maddowblog, News, Politics, White House
For proponents of ethical reforms, transparency and good government, the aftermath of the Watergate scandal and Richard Nixon’s resignation was an important and productive time. The White House controversy was so systemic, and the political fallout was so dramatic, that policymakers agreed to create all kinds of new limits and guardrails intended to prevent future presidential abuses, while trying to restore public confidence in the wake of a governmental crisis.
Presidents serving in the post-Watergate era didn’t always appreciate these restrictions, but they recognized the legal restraints — up until very recently.
Take the Presidential Records Act, for example. The post-Watergate law was created to force presidents to turn over all their records to the National Archivers, as part of a larger effort to combat corruption and ensure White House transparency. Last week, Donald Trump’s team unilaterally decided it doesn’t think the Presidential Records Act is constitutional and that it no longer intends to comply with the 48-year-old law.
It was a step down a familiar path. The New York Times published a memorable analysis on this in January:
From the opening days of his second term, President Trump took aim at Watergate’s ethical checkpoints as if in a shooting gallery. First, he fired 17 inspectors general, a job established in the Watergate era to ferret out waste, fraud and abuse in government. He also fired the head of the Office of Special Counsel, an independent agency created by legislation in 1978 to protect government whistle-blowers. Then he fired the director of the Office of Government Ethics, created around the same time to guard against financial conflicts of interest by top government officials. And
by Derrick Z. Jackson | Apr 7, 2026 | Opinion, Politics
Nicknamed the “God Squad” for its power to rule whether economic or national security interests outweigh the possibility of wiping out an animal species, the Endangered Species Committee has granted two exemptions to the Endangered Species Act since it was created by Congress in 1978. It is composed of the secretaries of the Interior, Agriculture and the Army, and the heads of the Environmental Protection Agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Council of Economic Advisers.
The last time the committee granted an exemption was in 1992.
The last time the committee granted an exemption was in 1992 when it allowed logging in sensitive areas for the northern spotted owl. Public outcry and litigation ultimately led to that requested exemption being withdrawn.
Last week, the committee was convened at the request of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. As gasoline prices in the U.S. have soared past $4 a gallon and diesel fuel past $5 during President Donald Trump’s reckless war on Iran, Hegseth told the committee it was “a critical matter of national security” that fossil fuel extraction in the Gulf of Mexico be prioritized over any species at risk of extinction.
Never mind that one of those species is the Rice’s whale, which NOAA itself acknowledges is one of the rarest in the world. The whale exists only in the Gulf, with perhaps 50 or so left.
After 15 whole minutes of discussion, the Endangered Species Committee (100% Trump appointees) decided that oil & gas companies in the Gulf of Mexico don’t need to exert any caution anymore to protect endangered whales, turtles, or other wildlife. www.washingtonpost.com/climate-envi…— Liz Neeley (@lizneeley.bsky.social) 2026-04-04T03:18:37.088Z
That obviously means
by Steve Benen | Apr 6, 2026 | Iran Tensions, Maddowblog, News, Politics
As many Americans woke up on Sunday morning, they were greeted with heartening news worth celebrating: A missing American airman who’d been shot down over Iran had been rescued as part of a successful military operation. Common sense might’ve suggested that Donald Trump, on Easter morning, would want the public to focus on the breakthrough developments.
The Republican president, however, appeared eager to change the conversation. MS NOW reported:
Fresh off the daring nighttime rescue of the U.S. airman shot down in Iran on Friday, President Donald Trump warned Iran Sunday morning, “Open the F*****’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell – JUST WATCH!”
The president then set a new deadline of 8 p.m. ET on Tuesday for Iran to reach a deal with the U.S., making yet another extension.
As difficult as it was to believe, this was the exact wording of the message Trump published to his social media platform on Sunday morning: “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the F*****’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell – JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah.”
If the president’s goal was to generate attention and spark some conversation, the missive was a remarkable success.
Over the course of just four sentences, Trump managed to breathe new life into the discussion about whether he has the mental stability to serve as the chief executive of a global superpower. He opened the door to plans for apparent war crimes. He peddled juvenile Islamophobia. He renewed questions about why there’s no one at the
