Trump brushes past the split
Donald Trump on Sunday suggested there may be differences inside his administration over how to handle Iran, while saying intelligence chief Tulsi Gabbard is “a little bit softer” than he is on the question of Tehran’s nuclear ambitions.
Asked by a reporter whether he still had confidence in Gabbard, Trump replied, “yeah, sure,” then added that she sees the issue differently.
“She’s a little bit different in her thought process than me,” Trump said aboard Air Force One as he flew back to Washington after a weekend at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida.
“But that doesn’t make somebody not available to serve. I would say that I’m very strong on the fact that I don’t want Iran to have a nuclear weapon because if they had a nuclear weapon, they’d use it immediately.”
He then made his view even clearer, as if the point needed any help getting through the tape recorder.
“I think she’s probably a little bit softer on that issue, but that’s okay.”
Mixed messages on Iran
Trump rarely acknowledges open debate among senior officials over the joint U.S.-Israeli campaign against Iran, which is now entering its second month.
Vice President JD Vance has taken a more cautious line on the conflict, while some other senior Republicans have privately worried about the domestic economic and political costs of the war.
The administration has also sent conflicting signals about Iran’s nuclear program itself.
In the lead-up to the war, some top officials said Iran was only weeks away from building a nuclear weapon. Others, including Trump, argued that another U.S.-Israeli campaign last summer had already wiped out Iran’s weapons program.
Iran, for its part, says its nuclear work is for peaceful purposes.
Gabbard’s testimony and a resignation
Gabbard, a former Democratic congresswoman now serving as intelligence chief, told lawmakers earlier this month that the U.S. intelligence community had “high confidence” that it knows where Iran stores its stockpile of highly enriched uranium.
At the time, she declined in public session to say whether the U.S. has the capability to destroy that stockpile.
The administration’s internal strain has not been limited to Gabbard. Joe Kent, an official close to her who led the National Counterterrorism Center, resigned earlier this month over the war. He said Iran did not pose an imminent threat to the United States.
So, yes, the administration is presenting a united front in the usual way: with public disagreement, private concern, and a very large amount of confidence.
