Did Israel Push Trump into War with Iran?

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Using the promo code WORLD at checkout. FastGrowingTrees.com, code WORLD. Now is the perfect time to plant. Let's grow together. Use the code WORLD to save today. Offer is valid for a limited time. Terms and conditions apply. Welcome back to Pod Save the World. I'm Tommy Vitor. I'm Ben Rhodes. Ben, Donald Trump has launched a brand new regime change war of choice in Iran that has engulfed the Middle East. Thank God the administration is finally taking this seriously and putting our best foot forward to explain that mission to the world. Let's watch. Good afternoon. The 10,113 meeting of the Security Council is called to order. I wasn't ready for that. I was not mentally prepared for that. I don't know how I, like the strange mix of things happening inside me. Cassie? Oh my God. Bloated? Embarrassment, anxiety. Something, it just triggers anxiety, like actually, because everything's making me anxious right now. Yeah, they may be anxious too. And she's not calming. No. You would think that that kind of, you know, Balkan accent would kind of calm us down. No, no, it didn't. That was, uh. As you guys probably could tell Melania Trump, the first lady, uh, who for some reason is presiding over a meeting of the UN Security Council. The New York Times pulled some key quotes from her speech. So Ben, she said she was there to promote, these are her own words, uh, quote, peace through education, which of course this was just days after, uh, the US or Israel bombed a school in Iran. Uh, quote, empathy for others, transcending geography, religion, race, gender, because nothing says empathy like Trump administration. I don't know. I guess this is just what they're doing at the UN these days. Can you imagine, uh, I mean, maybe she's on a roll from the, you know, blockbuster success of the Melania documentary paid for by Jeff Bezos at the expense of the Washington Post. Uh, but can you imagine being like some diplomat who has to sit in the chair, you know, uh. Worked your whole life for this. You worked your whole life to beat the United Nations. It used to matter so much. Yep. You probably envisioned being in the Security Council as like the pinnacle of your career. And now you're there to talk about like transcendental empathy with Melania Trump. Yeah. Or just, yeah, just attack some random minority group or whatever the hell she's doing up there. I mean, the trans people or something. It's, um, it's terrible. It's terrible. It's pretty bad out there, people. That's the theme for today. Uh, we're gonna talk through all the latest on Iran. We're gonna start with, um, some excerpts from Trump's first press conference since the war started on Saturday. Uh, the latest casualty numbers in the region, what we've learned about the stunning security failure that led to six US service members being killed and the administration's total lack of planning to help people, or Americans, I mean, uh, cross, stuck in the crossfire, sitting in overseas. We'll explain how a comment from Marco Rubio has ignited a huge debate over the role Israel played in getting Trump to go to war. What role Vice President J.D. Vance played in the deliberations and then Trump's outreach to Kurdish leaders and why that has increased our fear of a civil war in Iran big time. Finally, we're gonna talk about the role of the Supreme Leader in Iran uh, in the process to choose the next one. Then we'll update you on all things Cuba and end with some fun stuff about Pod Save the World fan favorite Kash Patel and his girlfriend. Need that update, please? Yeah. A little levity at the end there, I hope. Thank God. A little something. And then I, you did your interview. Yeah, I talked to, uh, Yasmeen Ansari, uh, who was with us a quick account, obviously. Excellent member of Congress. Uh, wonderful young member of Congress from Arizona, um, who's been a real progressive leader. Um, she's also the only Iranian-American Democrat in Congress, so she has a very unique, uh, vantage point on this. We talked about, uh, the information being provided to Congress, her complete lack thereof, uh, and how Democrats are thinking about things and what their strategy is going forward. We talked about, uh, you know, her kind of conflicting feelings about obviously being, you know, happy to see the demise of, uh, the Supreme Leader, uh, uh, Khamenei, you know, her parents had to flee Iran. Um, but she has been, you know, strongly opposed to the war, um, as illegal and unconstitutional. And frankly, the U.S. not, you know, imposing a government by Donald Trump is probably not the best solution here. Um, so we kind of unpacked all that. So it's a pretty powerful, powerful conversation. Um, it also kind of gives you the Congress view on things. She's really smart and young and thoughtful and like has a real connection to diaspora. And so it's an important interview. I'm glad you did it. Uh, also thanks everybody for watching, you know, this episode and all the bonus episodes we've been doing. We're trying to do a lot of coverage of this war because it really, really matters. When you subscribe to Pod Save the World, it makes a big difference. It helps people find us on YouTube. It helps the show go up the charts on Apple Podcasts. And it means that, uh, listeners will hear from people who are smart and decent, like Yasmeen Ansari. Yes. And not John Bolton or like whoever is getting booked over on Fox News. By the way, Fox News is all, it's like 2003. Oh yeah. 100% propaganda for the war. I have to say, and I'm not just saying this because, you know, we're now like fully partnered with MS, but CNN has been pretty, you know, their diversity of opinion seems to be like having Dave Petraeus and Brett McGurk on and, you know, like it's not a lot of, you know, anti-war progressive voices popping up out there. So please do help us get this kind of information in front of people because, you know, we're seeing kind of like a, an American media just not really meet this moment. Not meet the moment at all. It feels like 2003 all over again. I don't know if you caught, there was like someone tweeted out the list of guests on one of the, like the CBS News Sunday show post Barry Weiss. And it was like six war supporters, zero opponents. Yeah. What are we doing here? Nothing good. Learning nothing, learning nothing. Okay, Ben. So, um, four days after launching this reckless, stupid war of choice with Iran, President Trump finally took questions from the media. Uh, let's watch an excerpt. This is him sitting with Friedrich Merz, the, uh, chancellor of Germany. Did Israel force your hand to launch these strikes against Iran? No, I might've forced their hands. Uh, you see, we were having negotiations with these lunatics and it was my opinion that they were going to attack first. Mr. President, what's the worst case scenario that you have planned for in Iran? Uh, I guess the worst case would be we do this and then somebody takes over who's as bad as the previous person, right? That could happen. Uh, we don't want that to happen. It would probably be the worst. You go through this and then, uh, in five years, you realize you put somebody in who is no better. Most of the people we had in mind are dead. So, you know, we had some in mind from that group that is, uh, is dead. And now we have another group. They may be dead also. Based on reports. So I guess you have a third wave coming in pretty soon. We're not going to know anybody. I guess he is. Some people like him and we haven't been thinking about too much about that. It would seem to me that somebody from within my, maybe would be more appropriate. I've said that some of the European, like Spain has been terrible. In fact, I told Scott to cut off all dealings with Spain. By the way, we have massive amounts of ammunition, but, uh, we gave away a lot of high end, but we have plenty, but we have unlimited middle and upper ammunition, which is really what we're using in this war. And we have, uh, an un really an unlimited supply. I guess we're at Spain now. So it does seem like that the worst case scenario kind of occurred to him for the first time in the moment there. Um, doesn't give me a lot of hope in their day after planning. If, uh, Israel keeps killing the people in Iran, he's also lying about the unlimited ammunition. Like there's tons of reporting that we're running low on interceptor missiles and T lambs and others, but let's, um, let's carve off the Israel piece of this in a minute and get to that with the Rubio quote. What were your takeaways from this, uh, little mini press conference besides for Reza Pahlavi, just getting crushed there that he just keeps reinforcing the extent to which they have absolutely no plan or even expectation of what's going to happen inside of Iran, you know? So one possibility, which I always thought was insane. And we've said this repeatedly was this Reza Basically, the diaspora goes back and helps run a transition. Well, you know, he just got Maria Machado-ed by Trump. I mean, the same way that he dismissed her, he dismissed Pallavi. Frankly, she had a lot more of a Democratic claim on being in Venezuela, but put that aside. Then, you know, that's not even the worst case scenario. That's actually not, in a weird way, like just someone who's as bad as the charge of status quo. Could get worse. He's not even contemplating, and we'll get to this with the arming the Kurdish separatists. He's not even contemplating, truly seems to not understand that this could, I'm not saying it will, but this could become an Iraq's level civil war that kills hundreds of thousands of people and is regional and leads to millions and millions of refugees. Like, that's something that is possible, and he just doesn't seem to at all be concerned about that or even kind of aware of that possibility. He also seems to not feel like, and we talked about this a little bit, yesterday, there's nothing weight on his shoulders. Six Americans are dead. The global economy is, like, taking huge hits. There's all this uncertainty, and he's just like, eh, whatever. He's kind of, like, low-key in it. Like, it is weird. I'm sort of of two minds with this. Like, his tone seems weird and excessively chill there, given the stakes of what he's just started. Like, his entire presidency is at stake. But also, he did hide from the media for, like, three days, which he never does, especially in big moments. So, it does seem like maybe they were worried about going out. Yeah, that's true. And, you know, he kind of had to go out with Mertz. And so, I don't know. There's just no clarity or confidence of what the hell. They cannot, and this will lead into Rubio, they can't agree on why they're at war. They can't agree on what they're at war to do. They can't agree on how long the war is going to last. This is truly profoundly unnerving. I mean, it's unnerving enough when the Trump administration is like that about some trade disputes. This is about a major war they just started with one of the larger countries in the world in the middle of the Middle East. And they literally can't stay on message over the course of a day. And the other side is still shooting back. So, a few just sort of, like, major updates to quickly tick through. So, on Tuesday, the Israeli Air Force bombed a meeting of Iran's so-called Council of Experts. It's the 88-member council that is reportedly voting on who will take over the supreme leader's place. You would think that many experts. And we're not going to talk about that. We're going to talk about the Supreme Leader's place. day to operate. Oil prices, as of this recording, are up about 10% since last Friday. That is obviously a lot. It is still nothing compared to what will happen if Ron actually closes the Strait of Hormuz. Along those lines, Trump posted this weird message saying he directed the U.S. government to provide political risk insurance for all maritime trade through the Persian Gulf. Oh, yeah, really eye on the ball. If your mom is stuck in the Middle East, you're fucked. But, you know, let's get some political risk insurance to some hedge fund guy that has a trade on some energy. Well, he also said the U.S. will begin escorting tankers through the Strait of Hormuz. Can you imagine the cost of escorting every tanker through the Strait of Hormuz? And then, again, as we mentioned yesterday, like this has just been hugely disruptive to commerce all across the Middle East, especially places like Dubai. Amazon said that three of its facilities in the UAE and Bahrain have been damaged by drone attacks. That has messed with AWS data centers. Banks in the Emirates are having to work around low staffing. So, like, the economic fallout is just beginning. Oh, it's going to be billions upon billions. And look, again, the Gulf is going to change their security paradigm. And there's no way that, I mean, they won't do it tomorrow. But this kind of reliance on the United States to be the shield around us so that we can have our prosperous, secure, you know, existence has been shattered by this war. The lack of regard that the United States has for these countries, that it's like, oh, we'll start the war. You're going to get bombed. We're going to prioritize missile defense for Israel, not you. I mean. There's reports that Qatar and the UAE are like, you know, have a week or less worth of interceptor missiles. And then what? What's the plan? I mean, I do just want to, like, the pod started, you know, we've had highs and lows. Like, hello, people who voted for Donald Trump. Like, is this what the fuck you wanted? I mean, go find, this is insane what is happening. Put your phone on speaker, run down the street, find someone in a red hat and play this part. What is happening? And it's insane that, like, anyone would even try to kind of sane wash this of, like, well, we took out the supreme leader. Like, what is going on here, people? Did you, I saw Tom Cotton on TV saying that Iran has posed an imminent risk to the United States for 47 years. That's where we're at. That's the only defense they can make of this. Well, let's get into this sort of question of how this war started. So, since you and I talked yesterday, this clip of Secretary of State Marco Rubio talking about why the U.S. went to war with Iran has exploded onto the Internet. This was like 10 tweets by me last night. Yeah. So, let's watch Rubio, then let's sort of unpack it and talk about it. I don't understand what the confusion is. Let me explain it to you, and I'll do it once again as clearly as possible. Perhaps you'll report it that way. There's two reasons why now. The first is it was abundantly clear that if Iran came under. Attack by anyone, the United States or Israel or anyone, they were going to respond and respond against the United States. If we stood and waited for that attack to come first before we hit them, we would suffer much higher casualties. And so 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. And we knew that if we didn't preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties and perhaps even higher those killed. And then. We would all be here answering questions about why we knew that. All right. So I'm trying to unpack this in the kind of most charitable, measured way I can, because I know this is like a very sensitive piece of this conversation. But so what Rubio is trying to claim there is that the U.S. knew Israel was going to target Iran, which would lead to a retaliation by the Iranians against U.S. bases in the region. Therefore, the U.S. had to strike Iran first as a preemptive defensive effort, apparently telling Netanyahu not to start a war. It was not an option. Right. So this line of spin from Rubio evolved from an even more. Ridiculous claim that we saw over the weekend that was made during a White House briefing call for reporters where an official said the war started because there was an imminent threat of a preemptive Iranian attack on U.S. bases in the Middle East that would have led to mass casualties. Rubio is clarifying that that imminent threat was actually the Iranian response to an Israeli Israeli struck first. Right. Somehow the U.S. and Israel are never the aggressor in these situations. Rubio's quote is being widely taken as confirmation that the U.S. went to war because of Israel. This is not like a far left thing. It's not a far. Right. Right thing. It is everywhere. And of course, you know, the usual suspects are basically telling people who take Rubio's words at face value that that makes you an anti-Semite. But I think we should look at the totality of the evidence. So there's that quote we played from Rubio. Tom Cotton said something nearly identical on Fox. Tom Cotton said Israel faced an existential risk and they were prepared to strike Iran alone. If that happened, Iran was very likely to target our troops. That may address the question of why now. So, you know, Cotton has definitely got the talking points there. The New York Times. The New York Times said that in February, Netanyahu spent three hours persuading Trump to go to war in like whatever his eighth visit to the Oval Office since Trump took office. And then, as we mentioned yesterday, Netanyahu put out a statement after the war started bragging about how he's been waiting for this moment for 40 years and a partner like Donald Trump. So, Ben, as I've said before, like, I think there's. Oh, you forgot Mike Johnson. What did Mike Johnson say? Israel was determined to act with us or without us. So, ergo, we had to join because we would have gotten drunk. So, Mike Johnson, Speaker of the House, also said the same thing as Rubio and Cotton. Got it. Good addition. Thank you. So, again, like, I'm trying to be charitable here. Like I've said before, I still believe. I'm not. That I think this is about Trump's ego, right? He loves the adulation. He loves to be told Lindsey Graham is, you know, fluffing him, like, whatever, telling him he's a historic figure. For the people not watching on YouTube, there's a little. Sorry. Those doing the six, seven thing on his balls. But I do think, like, it is two reasons in my mind. Ego. And then, like, the pressure from Netanyahu. Because Rubio conceded, like, the answer to why did this start on Saturday is because we knew the Israelis were going to act. And, like, bigger picture, if you say, well, there's still this threat from the Iranians, I just do think you have to be honest that there is no imminent nuclear threat. It's not one that's months or even over a year away, right? It's buried under the ground. There is no imminent threat to the U.S. from Iran's ballistic missiles. That is, like, a 2035 timeline, according to the Defense Intelligence Agency. And the protesters Trump said that he was going to save with a military strike are all dead. And they've been dead for a while now. As are the three people he wanted to lead Iran, apparently. Right. And then three after them and three after them. So, like, even this new spin that Iran could produce so many conventional weapons that they created a conventional umbrella to protect their nuclear program. Rubio says in that same press event that they were a year away from that threshold. So, again, like, I'm trying to be charitable. I get the sensitivity. But, like, this war started on Saturday because the Israelis wanted it to. Yes. How do you argue that? Who else supported it, too? I mean, we've talked about this. You cannot, like, Lindsey Graham and the Israeli government are kind of some of the only individuals, like, you know, I don't know, John Bolton. Do you buy this report? Do you see the Washington Post said that Mohammed bin Salman was calling to lobby to go to war? I do. I do not buy that report. It's only they've reported it. I did not hear that. I've been talking to people in the Gulf from before this war. Egypt was against this publicly, and they don't really do things without checking with the Saudis first. That felt like somebody else wanting to kind of spread this around, right? And the Saudis denied it immediately and pretty vocally, too. Anyone who listens to this podcast knows I'm not, like, some big fan of the Saudis. But if you look at what Saudi Arabia has done in the last few years, Mohammed bin Salman did a rapprochement with Iran. He wanted stability. Like, why would he do a rapprochement with them, you know, brokered by China, and then turn around and be like, you know what I want? I want to, like, topple a regime with no plan for what comes after and have my, you know, the veneer of security that I've created in this country shattered by Iranian drones and have Aramco, Saudi Aramco fields, oil fields on fire. And, no, I just don't believe that. So I'm not saying, I'm not blaming Israel entirely at all. This is Donald Trump. This is Donald Trump's fault. Nor is it absolving Iran of the bullshit they do, right? Yeah, but, like, and actually I want to be very clear about this, because, like, this is, when he said this yesterday, at first my reaction was, I can't believe he said that. It's like the classic gaffe where you say the truth, like everybody else has been spinning and Rubio is actually telling the truth. And then I thought they'd clean it up, which they did today. But yesterday they tweeted out Rubio's comment from the White House rapid response account. Did you see that? No. Like, like, so this was not something they. They were, like, hiding. It just, it's what everybody has been seeing. Like, why has Bibi Netanyahu come to visit Donald Trump seven times, right? He, the last time, the 12-day war, he got Trump into that one. Israel actually started bombing and then was like, come along, guys. Like, you better get involved here, you know? So it's been very evident that Israel wants this. They have not concealed the fact that they want to do it. And, like, the thing that is. Like, so maddening is that Trump can say no. Like, absent from any of these comments by tough guys like Tom Cotton and Marco Rubio is the notion that if Bibi comes to Trump or any president of the United States, because he came to Obama and wanted to bomb Iran. I'm sure he came to Biden and wanted him to bomb Iran. Obama said no. Biden said no. Like, George W. Bush said no to them. And this guy started the Iraq war. And Donald Trump can say no. I'm not going to do this. No, by the way, I'm not gonna do that. going to support you doing it either right now because it puts our people at risk that is an option that is available to him that has been taken by every u.s president not named donald trump in the 21st century yeah and and and so it's not some fait accompli and i just want to say like if you want to call us all anti-semites for just pointing out the reality that this is at least a part of what happened it's not again not the whole reason then that term means nothing anymore like it's it's so dangerous to do that because like if people are like i'm watching this and i've got a video of the prime minister of israel saying he's wanted to do this for four years and finally got donald trump to do it and then if i like repeat those words out loud i get called an anti-semite then the term means nothing and also you should read the israeli press and how critical they are and then yeah i want things and like you realize how silly it is yes i like again i'm aware of the sensitivity it matters i get it but like just the most cynical people in washington dc are having this attack and calling people anti-semites when you just point out what rubio said and i think look i think what rubio said was um the truth on some level um certainly is the truth about the timing right and also is going to do extraordinary and lasting damage to um support for israel within the mega world because now it is going to be taken as an article of faith that we are at war with iran because of israel and everything the bad that comes after will be tagged with iran also one other thing i want to run by you ben so i have a really good friend who um occasionally will i geek out and like forward articles me like what do you think of this so he forwarded me this um piece from the free press i want to read you a little bit that's sort of like talking about what the free press is arguing this person in the free press this op-ed is the real reason for the war these are all quotes america is in this fight because of china specifically it is about dismantling the most significant chinese ford based outside of east asia then it goes on to talk about like chinese weapon sales to iran like iranian adoption of chinese technology that is like a lot of people are talking about like a little skeptical the picture that emerges from all of this is of a chinese forward base a linchpin of the country's naval architecture cyber cyber efforts and economic belt and road influence program every element of the chinese power projection and empire building positioned at the throat of the global oil supply armed with weapons designed to penetrate advanced american defenses and kill american sailors and embedded in a strategic architecture whose explicit purpose is to constrain american military freedom and any future conflict over taiwan my friend was like what do you think of this article and i was like look at first blush like if this if this war was about china i think the administration would say that because that would be like the most popular thing you could probably say politically like war with iran on to take out the chinese like that would be a winner um this criticism of uh iran for buying chinese tech is probably because we've sanctioned them and refused they're gonna buy our tech and then finally um uh this idea that this is like a forward operate like i i think if anything this war with iran is is weakening our ability to fight a war with china pretty substantially as we've talked about with the you know dwindling supply of tomahawk missiles and others but i was just i wanted to get your blind reaction to this article and i mean this is coming from literally i'd never heard this argument this is i was gonna say first of all like i've had to follow this iran issue as of you as close as anything else in my life you know for the last 12 years and i've never heard that argument made like i mean it's bonkers uh i mean i mean the two things i say about it are number one this war is helping china immeasurably right because it's just further making the united states seem chaotic and an aggressor and a source of instability in the world to every other country you know you know like some you know as we talked about some of these europeans and like mark carney are seemingly unable to find a voice on this thing but let's just take the actual swing regions of the world the global south like i guarantee you that this world war is terrifying them and is going to drive them closer to china and then also the idea that the chinese were going to like project power through iran it's just not actually the people that are super um apocalyptic about the spreading influence of china they focus more on this kind of belt road through the indian ocean down to africa and then into latin america i could actually i heard a lot more arguments that chinese uh presence and influence in venezuela was a date dangerous than this do they do they sell do they buy a bunch of oil from iran yeah do they sell their tech there yeah because they're they're sanctioned well iran's not going to sell it anywhere else but no i i think that's a garbage rationale very surprising article um uh the other like really interesting political story about the deliberations around going to war with iran uh is the role jd vance played so jd vance is the vice president he famously wrote an op-ed with the headline trump's best foreign policy not starting any wars that one aged well i don't know but the new york times and now several other outlets have reported that vance actually pushed trump to start a bigger war with iran so remember there were reports that trump might order like a limited strike to pressure the iranians into making a deal vance reportedly convinced trump to go uh quote go big and go fast so uh that was remarkable to me ben i mean it should not be it should not surprise anyone that jd vance is completely full of shit and he's you know kind of like upended all his beliefs but i do think politically like he now owns whatever disaster comes out of this just as much as trump as does marco rubio and like i don't know like if things in iran go the way they think they're going to go it does open up a pretty big lane for a like actually anti-war anti-interventionist maga voice in 2028 i don't know who that would be it could be thomas massey or somebody could be tucker carlson could be it could be tucker carlson actually yes now yeah because the point the one thing i'd say about this is that you saw the classic uh this is a great report uh someone close to the vice president told us that he was against the iranian war against this uh you know uh but then said go big but he won't comment but it was such a clearly sanctioned leak you know you can tell these things everywhere but here's the language here's the thing he can precisely because he cannot publicly say anything bad about trump or else he's going to be kneecapped you can leak all he want he's going to own this just as much as trump and the same is true of rubio because you know up to to the moment that the next republican nominee is is uh nominated to kiss trump's ass and can't say that that trump did anything wrong because it's not like he can go out and say like i was against this and it's a mistake like donald trump would you know eviscerate him if he does that so he owns this as he should and the far right of the republican party is uh in revolt it's not just tucker carlson who is apoplectic over the war nick fuentes is going nuts calling trump a joke megan kelly has been pretty critical a lot of like kind of maga influencer types like there is a there is a very early body of concern about what's happening in iran that you did not see around venezuela or at least not to this extent no no no and it's and it's real because it's it's tapping into something that the the mag of maga voters like like we've talked about the fact that they're anti-war um but some of them are veterans who fought in multiple tours and felt completely betrayed by their government right and and and so it's emotional too it's not just you know this is not just like a and they're alive check checklist they're right to be pissed they're alive too uh there's been a lot of tiktok stories about how the war came together just for for non-nerds a tiktok story is kind of like when the white house press office brings you in and they do like a behind the scenes blow by blow of how something happened a couple little anecdotes from the financial times version that i just jumped out of me so the ft says that the traffic cameras in tehran got hacked by the massad and those images were being transmitted to israel and that's how they were tracking government leaders including knowing that the supreme leader was going to be like at that office when they bombed it at the time so it's sort of interesting to learn they also apparently were able to disable uh cell phone towers in the area so no one could call in a warning and then interestingly then so the ft said the israelis knew of of hamane's movements via the second channel but the cia had a human source um so interesting if true also you know maybe don't leak that uh while the war is in like day four guys but you know that's the thing i felt i have to say look it's interesting you know what a surprise uh the massad and the cia have good intelligence but the i mean we were like chuckling about the fact that the cia was doing this giant victory lap over identifying the location of hamane in his office um but it points to like a bigger point like trump clearly like loves this initial round of uh you know the way the american media chooses to cover wars which is like i find these stories grotesque to tell you the truth but i think it's really the truth and that's i'm not criticizing the journalists like they like you you know you have to i'm kind of criticizing that the people that went out to do these tiktoks you know like there's two guys that did some tiktoks back in the day i know but like i don't know that but not like this i mean honestly like we did on like bin laden operation um afghanistan a lot of it was just like look the the tiktok story is a first draft of history yeah it's trying to explain how you came to an argument i agree with you that there is a version of it that is like preening and like false heroism and i don't know i guess what i'm getting at is that um here's what i'm trying to say so you're i'll mend what i say there's the tiktok stories are a part of like just how you tell a story out of a communications office i guess what i'm trying to get at is that they seem to put more thought into the tiktok stories than about their strategy oh absolutely that that's that's the thing that pisses me off is that like they have the time to go out and be like here are the intricate details of how we like turned off traffic lights and you had to human source and found the supreme leader and killed them and then if you ask that same uh spokesperson uh what is the objective of this military operation they can't answer the question and so it like what like trump loves this part of the war you know it seems like he's taken 19 calls from random reporters like including like some rachel bade's sub stack like he's so far down the call it seems like he doesn't get that this isn't working out it's not helping him he's putting out competing messages he sounds incoherent all over the place they've completely abandoned the like rise up you know regime change message although let's let's get to that so um we've talked about how like we're concerned that this could you know spill into a civil war that iran could split that you could see like ethnic or sectarian fighting um you've mentioned uh the balook separatists who are sunni muslims who primarily live on the border of pakistan and have a a separatist kind of like violent uh wing uh then there's about 10 of the iranian population is kurdish i believe um according to axios uh trump called several kurdish leaders in iraq either on sunday or monday the wall street journal confirmed that reporting and then said that trump is willing to provide support to groups in iran who are willing to take up arms against the iranian regime i assume that means weapons or else that support is not worth anything um and then an israeli outlet called israel hayom uh which is owned by miriam adelson ran a piece with the headline quote the american israeli plan chaos will push for a coup against revolution so it seems like um the trump administration and the netanyahu gang they're not just like kind of unconcerned about civil war in iran but they might be actively actively contributing to it starting by supporting these um these groups like the kurds and then again like so what they're asking is these little ethnic minority groups to go to battle against the irgc which is according to the ft about 190 000 strong and they're heavily armed they have their own intelligence component they have their own navy they have their own air force they have their own economic and social security and they have their own military they have their own military they have economic interests they have their own relationship with terror groups like hezbollah and then you have the basij militia which is a civilian paramilitary force that ranges from like hundreds of thousands of members in size to over a million and depending on which analyst you believe you know it's like they can look they can um they're controlled by the irgc but sort of more loosely and so it's just it's hard to think of um a worse yes scenario for average iranian civilians than like this faction of kurds trying to do battle with the irgc and everybody else is just stuck in the middle this is the single worst possible idea that you could pursue and i really mean that and that like i'm we're gonna be wrong about some things we predict nobody knows everything that's gonna happen i do know that this is a bad idea um you have um you know uh like persia the obviously persian is the biggest group in in iran but you have significant ethnic minorities the kurds have long-standing ties to israel and there have been plenty of reports that the israelis have used kurds for you know the certain operations inside of iran in the past um in the balukistan separatists that's a real separatist movement that has clashed violently with iranian security forces and that crosses the border into pakistan in the same way as to the kurds that the kurds cross the border into iraq and so what you could get is a situation if you are arming kurdish and then potentially baluk separatists you are not just causing a potential civil war like in lebanon or in syria or in iraq sectarian conflict and you know how violent those can get you are potentially making it a regional sectarian war where all of a sudden the iraqis and the and the turks are like do we have to go back into northern you know iraq to fight our the kurds in this country and then pakistan comes in to fight the baluk separatists and then suddenly what pakistan and turkey are involved in the iran civil war this is a nightmare scenario and it's not the way to do this yeah it's um it i could not believe when i read that why is donald trump calling anybody knows this it's crazy but but unless the strategy is chaos and again like the cynical view of the israeli strategy is make it violent chaos then we have regional hegemony because everybody else is kind of consumed with their own problems as in lebanon ben before we take a break just two great ways to support progressive independent media first of all everyone should subscribe to your sub stack yes i will be and i'll be releasing a new one tonight about tuesday night um uh so please check out on sub stack notes on the stories we tell is the name of the sub stack but you can just look up ben rhodes on sub stack you are 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now crooked.com slash friends all right ben so the supreme leader is dead um as we mentioned at the top on tuesday the israelis bombed the meeting where there was supposed to be a vote to replace him so there might be a leadership vacuum for a bit although as we were recording there's a bunch of like people are tweeting about one report there's reports about the supreme leader's son uh being named supreme leader ahmed's son being named supreme leader which is something that kind of one of the likely scenarios because the perception for a long time with how many was trying to kind of grease the skids for his son who's a hardliner who's very close to the rgc so this would not be a reformist guy but who knows he could have been killed in that strike or right we just don't know it's not confirmed yet but if he is the person just that is a reinforcement of a hard line and he'll obviously be targeted for assassination too yeah and i think already was targeted for assassination by the israelis so let's talk for a minute about who uh ayatollah khamenei was in the process to pick his replacement so how many was 86 as we've said he uh he'd been in power for almost 37 years but his legacy went back to 1979 in the islamic revolution because he came to power uh in 89 but had served two terms as iran's president so um what comes next will be only the second leadership change in iran's post-revolution history which is pretty incredible if you think about it um how many was a truly awful person and i think by every conceivable measure a failure to be a president of iran is a failure to be a leader i mean he wasted billions of dollars on a nuclear program that never got him a nuke he wasted billions of dollars supporting proxy forces like hezbollah that did not keep him or his country safe uh and i think the economists kind of succinctly put it when they said he was the man who quote kept iranians isolated from the world for more than three decades who ruined their economy and who when they dared to speak out against his misrule ordered them slaughtered by the thousands well said um but in iran's system the supreme leader is everything you're a final decider in politics so the next supreme leader will be chosen by a group called the assembly of experts that is that a group of 88 clerics uh who apparently were meeting today and bombed so not sure what that means for the process going forward but i guess we'll find out uh again you you mentioned one option the the current supreme leaders or ex-supreme leader's son um there's a bunch of speculation out there i was going to take through a bunch of names and then i realized like no one knows who we're talking about and also trump seems to think they're all getting killed yeah you start dropping like larry and johnny's name or yeah okay that poor guy gets you'd sort of larry johnny's name gets pushed out there right as the israelis start like taking out people well he's kind of like the guy who's like in the uh his role is kind of like in that movie about the selection of the pope the guy who's supposed to facilitate the process or it's like dick cheney yeah like selecting the vp you know so uh he's supposed to be but but look i think the one point about hominy you know because a lot's been said about what a creepy is and you said it well is that there were alternatives in the sense that this was not a monolithic system and periodically at multiple points in the history of the islamic republic there have been presidents even of the islamic republic who wanted to move in a different direction by the way i i used to get all this shit people but there's no such thing as a moderate no there are there are people that are more moderate than you know fucking common a hominy or uh custom solomony the head of the rgc and hominy would not let them do that you know he'd always keep it on such a short leash that he couldn't truly explore what it'd be like to open things up a bit inside the country or to try to have a more meaningful detente with the west and so i i i you know he was someone who had different alternatives available to him even within the system they constructed point is that you know i i know most iranians who don't like the islamic republic just wanted to go away and i get that but he could have chosen to have a like a like a less extreme version of the islamic republic and he wouldn't even do that yeah and and now he's you know now he's met his end yeah twitter would get very offended if you ever pointed out that there might be differing political views in iran it's um there's just a difference by just a flatness society yeah well i mean there's rahani the the president that that obama was dealing with but then there was the green movement right which those were people uh musavi who was the green uh candidate in the 2009 election was from within the system like you know the you know they they they were weren't coming to overthrow the government. They were running through the process. And so there were these political figures available who could have led to a different type of Islamic republic. He always wanted – he always chose the hardest line. And then you have Ahmadinejad who I think the Israelis just bombed him for sport. I mean – Honestly, if they did kill him, that's strange and kind of twisted because he's not an active politician. Do you think it was a possible concern that he could be a future leader and they wanted to take him out or just like straight vengeance? I feel – and defending that guy, he was a creep and a Holocaust denier. But like near as I can tell, he's been like tweeting about American sports and like – I don't think he's an active politician. So I said to you it would be like if someone did a regime change here and like killed Dan Quayle. It's like what – I don't really know. What did Dan do? But it does just make it feel like vengeance and that's not a good way to do these things. It does make it seem like blood sport. Although I always will think of – I always will think of that SNL skit where they talk about him looking like a fly Jake Chilton. Yeah, yeah. You have to laugh at something. Anyway, anything else on Iran before we go to Cuba? No. I mean we'll stay on top of this. I would just say that we'll try to do our best to be as straight as we can without being like hyperbolically negative or rosy. And today's is one of those days where it just doesn't feel very good. That could – maybe we'll have a better day tomorrow. But like – Honestly, it's just like these are not good indicators. It feels pretty unsettling. And thank you for watching. And thank you again for subscribing to Pod Save the World on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, let's turn to Cuba, Ben. Because a friend of the show, Lindy Graham, kind of set the stage for our conversation today in this brief excerpt from his Fox News interview. Let's watch. Cuba's next. They're going to fall. This communist dictatorship in Cuba, their days are numbered. How many martinis do you think he had before that hit? I mean it's just extraordinary. The man's whole M.O. is to just get seemingly completely hammered and just scream about bombing different countries on television. The man regime change. Something is deeply wrong with that guy. So we have discussed several times previously the humanitarian situation in Cuba. It is just dire. It's beyond dire. The U.S. had blocked all foreign oil shipments to Cuba. Then last week they amended the policy to allow U.S. companies to send fuel to businesses in Cuba. It sounds like the idea is to help private companies while somehow end running the government to promote capitalism or something. I don't get how that would work in practice. I talked to some experts about this and the thing is the stated strategy is that you're trying to help the private sector. How do you get it to them? The people who will be able to take advantage of this in Cuba are the people who have some means. And connections. And connections. So the people that are starving are not going to benefit from this at all. So this feels more like a messaging exercise than some. Actual rational policy to alleviate the humanitarian crisis that the United States is creating. Yeah. Last week Trump said the U.S. is holding talks with Cuba and said, quote, maybe we'll have a friendly takeover of Cuba. He also said Cuba is, to put it mildly, a failed nation. It's really right now a nation in deep trouble and they want our help. End quote. So Axios reported that Marco Rubio has been talking with Raul Castro's grandson about God knows what, I guess, transition. But what brings us, that all brings us to this crazy story from last week. It's about a boat battle between 10 would-be liberators of Cuba and a Cuban border patrol boat. This went down last Wednesday. This is a speedboat with 10 guys on it of Cuban descent, two of whom are American citizens, took off from Florida to Cuba. They reportedly brought with them high-powered rifles, nearly 13,000 rounds of ammo, Starlink satellite kits, a drone, and then a bunch more combat gear. The Wall Street Journal says their goal was to, quote, infiltrate the island little by little and spark a rebellion against a bankrupt regime. According to Cuban authorities, the patrol boat approached the speedboat, whereupon the men on the speedboat opened fire. And in the end, three men were killed and seven were wounded. One Cuban soldier was injured. According to the journal, quote, Relatives of the men said that the men lacked military training and capabilities and that they had unrealistic expectations. End quote. You don't say. So, Ben, the coverage of this, like, little kind of Timo Cuba regime change operation makes it sound like these guys were very naive. They did something very stupid. And they probably didn't do anything. They probably did it on their own. But you never know. It does bring back memories of, like, the Operation Mongoose CIA, you know, executed paramilitary bullshit we used to do. Like, the CIA funded lots of efforts to fuck with the Cubans that were short of the Bay of Pigs is the kind of, like, short answer here. And then there's some speculation in these articles that Cuban intelligence was onto these guys because this patrol boat intercepted them, like, kind of in the middle of nowhere during the day with a fuel shortage, et cetera. I don't know. Curious what you made of all that. And then second, like… Rubio talking to Castro's grandson. Is that the right channel? So, first of all, I'm entirely believable that these guys did this. And look, you know, they're replicating. I mean, Fidel and Raul Castro landed in a small boat, the grandma in Cuba. There were, like, seven guys. Now, they were a little bit more ideologically coherent than these people. Not saying I agree with that ideology, but they had a plan. There's a lot of this. There's a lot of this kind of sabotage. There's a lot of sabotage operations. There's the history of Operation Mongoose. There are a lot of groups down in Miami that would like to overthrow the Cuban government. And I don't put it past Tommy. Some Trump associates kind of, you know, maybe saying, oh, great idea. I mean, we had this in Venezuela. Funding it on the side or something. Yeah, the guys in Mar-a-Lago were meeting with, like, ex-Special Forces guys who tried to do a coup in Venezuela and got arrested. The Cuban intelligence is deeply embedded in these Miami networks. That was my sense. I mean, I used to tell people in Miami, like, you know, some of the Cubans would joke with me that the U.S. democracy funding was funding some of their intelligence because they'd so thoroughly penetrated all these Miami dissident groups, you know. It sounded like these guys were talking politics out of Versailles, which is, like, a phase. Well, yeah. And I'm not siding with that. But I believe that the Cubans have these groups pretty penetrated, too. In terms of the outreach, I negotiated for, you know. Three and a half years with Alejandro Castro, Raul Castro's son. I will say that Raul Castro and his family are more pragmatic than the hardliners. And, in fact, they got sidelined in part because they did the opening with us in the Obama administration. The Fidel had not really supported it that much. In fact, kind of opposed it in a lot of ways. And that a lot of the hardliners, after Trump yanked the rug on them, said, oh, see what you did? Like, you know, we never should have trusted the Americans. And so you got much more hardline people kind of running Cuba. And it's not Diaz-Canel who's the president. There's kind of like a collection of hardliners. So the idea, Raul still has a lot of power and he's still the ultimate kind of supreme leader, as it were. He's deep in his 90s. So that's one destination to go. But what are you negotiating? Because what Trump is totally wrong about is friendly takeover. This is a regime deeply committed to its own survival. They're negotiating to try to survive, not to have a friendly takeover. I mean, this guy's, just the idea that we're talking about the regime change in Venezuela, Cuba, and Iran within like the first quarter of this year is insane. And clearly, it's just Trump's ego wanting to be like, I finally slayed all these dragons. But man, it's going to create a lot of instability. Yeah, and the person running the policy in every instance is Marco Rubio. And the people doing the negotiations in every instance are Steve Wyckoff and Jared Kushner. And it's like, you know what? Yeah. We gave Kushner and Wyckoff love for basically pressuring the Israelis to agree to a ceasefire and getting the hostages out. Like, that was a good thing. That ceasefire, as we've discussed many times, is a joke. But like, let's look at the rest of the Wyckoff-Kushner record. How's it going in Ukraine, right? Remember when we were going to end that war in 24 hours? It's now been well over a year. The negotiations with Iran had not only been failures, but like halfway through, the Israelis end up bombing. Like, maybe we should send some pros? Maybe some people who actually know about Iran and its nuclear program. Or when I went to Cuba to negotiate, I was with Ricardo Zuniga, who was on this podcast last week. You could all hear it for yourself. Like, the guy had been deep. He'd lived and served in Cuba as a human rights officer for the U.S. So, I mean, you don't get a sense that they are. I mean, Marco Rubio, he's never been to Cuba. I mean, and this is something I think people don't understand. Like, he obviously comes from a Cuban family. But he's never been to Cuba. He's never been to Cuba, right? I don't think he understands the dynamics as well as he thinks he does. Well, also, Trump thinks that everyone thinks like him and negotiates like him. And again, the dumbest bullshit we've all had to read for the last however many years is that, like, you got to think differently. You got to shake things up. You got to treat it like a real estate deal. What are they going to get? What are we going to get? And, like, these guys don't understand the role of, like, beliefs and ideology. Narrative ideology. Something bigger than yourself, right? Because for Trump, it is all transactional. It's all selfish. It's all about himself. So, not for these guys. All right, Ben, finally, we want to lighten it up a bit with some of the latest news about FBI Director Kash Patel and his country singing sensation girlfriend, Alexis Wilkins. You guys might remember our coverage of Kash Patel's trip to the Olympics where Kash chugged beer with the men's hockey team. It was a universally beloved segment. As predicted, we've since learned that Trump was not happy about Kash's behavior. According to NBC News, Trump told Patel that he did not like the images of him. chugging beer in that jersey looking like a stupid goober. Uh, nor did he like Patel using a government plane to fly to Milan. So feel free to fire the guy. Um, and then our masochistic producer, Michael spent an hour watching a Twitter Q and a that Alexis Wilkins did where she, I don't, she's like, that could be fun. I mean, that could actually be, was it fun? No, he says that was not fun. She just talks to herself and takes questions. Is the gist? Yeah. He says, he says, yeah. Uh, she was asked about the Olympics trip and what happened. Here's Alexis's answer. What do you think Elon Doge's opinion would be on spending hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash drink beer with hockey players? So I really am not going to dip too much into this because this is kind of my, my whole point. But what I will say is the Bureau has long been in charge of providing security for the Olympics and that's what was happening. So I think that we should be probably more concerned with the fact that, you know, the Democrats were trying to spend millions of dollars to see if mice can be transgender and the fact that that has stopped. Clears it up, right? You got it now. I just, I, I, I just, this is the dumbest fucking fascism in human history. People like, I mean, I knew that the American version of fascism was going to be stupid, but between like from the, the spectrum of Melania Trump at the UN security council through the insane management of this war to that person, like saying those words out loud, the FBI does not provide the fucking security at the Olympics. Like, like, gosh, Patel certainly doesn't. I mean, they may be part of like a whole collective effort. The transgender mice. If Philip Roth. Could have imagined that. Who had written some very different books. Ben, look, we're not done with Alexis because the New York Times wrote this big profile of Alexis Wilkins, Cash's girlfriend. The story is, it's one of those pieces of reporting that is so funny and just like a really dry way. Um, so it describes her as, I love, so this was a master of the, of the genre. It describes her as quote, uh, one of the best protected country singers in the United States because cash has put an FBI SWAT team on duty to protect her at all times. Uh, here's a couple more lines from the story. Uh, this is all verbatim last April agents and two SUVs stood guard outside a senior center in Ronald Reagan's. I like that one. Uh, this is a quote from someone that I would say she's an amateur, maybe an aspiring country music artist said the long time country music critic, Kyle Cornelius of saving country music.com on the national Anthem. I'd probably give her a 7.5 on a 10 scale, he said. So she's a C and this is my favorite part, Ben. So, uh, Ms. Wilkins, the daughter of a financial specialist in the aerospace industry, her mother, and a global consumer products executive for Gillette, her father, and his wife. And so, um, so this is a quote from someone that I would say, she's an amateur, maybe an aspiring country music artist, said the longtime country music critic, Kyle Cornelius of saving country music.com on the national Anthem. industry, her mother, and a global consumer products executive for Gillette, her father, have lived in London and Switzerland and for a time attended elementary school at College du Le Mans in Geneva. She's originally from the Boston suburb of Weymouth, but likes to emphasize her time living in Arkansas. Quote, there are just some things the limousine liberal will never understand from the coasts, she recently wrote. You know, the thing about this that drives me nuts is, people may not know this about me, Tommy, but my father's from Rosenberg, Texas, and is one of like 42 first cousins, I think almost all of whom are still in Texas. They live in, I'm not even going to say because in this case, but they live in like rural parts of Texas. So I was raised on like Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, like outlaw country, Jerry Jeff Williams. You know, like some fucking legends, all right, like some goddamn legends and people that actually didn't have to be this kind of sanitized right wing version of country music. So in addition to her being kind of full of it and being a ridiculous way for us to be spending tens of millions of dollars in taxpayer money, I'm offended by this version of country music. It's just this kind of soft, you know, turning point USA, like propaganda, you know, bullshit propaganda music. Yeah. Like, like go listen to some fucking Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, and then learn about some country music. And then come back to me. I'd rather have, let's have some SWAT teams protecting Willie because he's still out there doing it. He is. He's still out there on the road. We got Willie Nelson. We can get fucking high after this show on Willie Nelson. Those edible, what are those called? Is it drink or whatever? I don't know. I mean, let's do that, right? Cause that's a way to celebrate this country. Amen. Getting high with Willie Nelson. Amen. Like, like then rather than listening to this garbage. Yeah. I don't think Willie Nelson was supporting everything the FBI director said. And unless you think we're being too mean to Alexis Wilkins and she's just a random civilian. I just want to point out that, uh, beginning a day after Alex Preddy's murder by ice up in Minnesota, she called him a domestic terrorist, an idiot, and a vigilante. So this is a person who's very much operating in the kind of like nasty MAGA media space. And is what it is. Yeah, it is what it is. Unfortunately. Anyway, uh, so that's that, uh, we're going to take a quick break. When we come back, you're gonna hear Ben's interview with Congresswoman Yasmin Ansari. We're going to talk about Iran, the diaspora, uh, possible war powers votes, what Congress can do to actually stop this insane regime chained war of choice. So stick around for that. All right. We are very pleased, uh, to be joined again, uh, by Congresswoman Yasmin Ansari who represents Arizona's third district. She's also the only Iranian American Democrat in Congress and one of the younger members of Congress member of the progressive caucus friend of the pod. Uh, thank you so much for being here. Thanks for having me. All right. I want to get to, to your, uh, reactions personally, you know, from, from various vantage points, but, but before even getting to that, uh, I'm just curious as a member of Congress, how are you being kept informed about this war? You know, how did you learn about it? Have you been briefed? Are there upcoming briefings? Do you feel like you're getting the information you need? We have not been briefed about this war at all today, right after we are chatting today, we will have our very first, um, you know, classified briefing by secretary Rubio and Hegseth and others. Um, the briefings, you know, this is, these are open to every single member of Congress. They're typically just one hour long. They're not going to be briefed. They're going to be briefed. movement. And when Khamenei was killed, the Supreme Leader, you know, you were very strong in kind of condemning the evil legacy that he represented. At the same time, you've taken, in knowing you, a very principled position that despite those feelings about the regime, you know, the U.S. and Israel bombing it kind of with no plan is not the right course of action. And so you've been kind of strongly opposed to that course of action. I know there's a lot there. Let's just begin with how have you personally tried to process this as both a member of Congress and obviously someone who cares deeply about this situation for lots of reasons? Thank you for the question. You know, for the audience, you know, I'll share. My parents fled the regime in the 70s, and they were very, very anti-Islamic revolution. This is actually something that is relatively rare. At the time, the revolution was very popular. My family was always against the Islamic Republic before it became obvious that they were violent, theocratic, murderous dictators. My grandfather was a monarchist. He served in elected leadership at the city council level in Iran. He was imprisoned when the revolution took place. I've had cousins who have been beheaded by the Islamic Republic. So I say all this information to say that I despise the Islamic Republic. I despise the Islamic Republic. like the vast majority of Iranians inside and outside of the country for good reason. They just slaughtered up to potentially tens of thousands of people. And it's true that they are left alone and that there's really, you know, it's very difficult to overthrow a regime, you know, unarmed and against such a tyrannical group of individuals who quite frankly will do whatever it takes to survive. That being said, I think multiple things can be true at one time. I'm a U.S. Congresswoman concerned about the Constitution of the United States that Donald Trump has been shredding since he took office last year. Donald Trump did not have the constitutional authority to start a war with Iran without coming to Congress first and without making a case to the American people. It is wonderful. That Khamenei has been murdered. And I understand the very complex feelings. You'll see a lot of Iranians celebrating that as it should be celebrated. And all of these things have happened. And now, you know, what I think about a lot and what I've been talking to Iranians both inside and outside of the country about is what is the plan for what comes next? What my concern is, is that Donald Trump, just as he's demonstrated here in the United States, that he does not care about democracy, that he doesn't have a plan, that he moves around from issues of democracy, that he doesn't care about democracy, that he doesn't care about the issue to issue. That I'm concerned about the future of Iran now. You've taken out the supreme leader. Schools are being bombed. Now there's reporting coming out and a piece soon in the Atlantic that hundreds of millions of dollars are being funneled to Kurdish separatist groups in Iraq, which could then cause a civil war in the country. The MEK, which is a cult terrorist group, is part of that. We're hearing also from Donald Trump about, you know, making deals with somebody else in the regime. I just worry that Donald Trump, based on everything he has said and exhibited so far, does not have a real plan that will lead to actual stability and democracy for the Iranian people, which is honestly what I want at the end of the day. I don't want to see American troops harmed. I'm worried about the Americans who are in the Middle East right now. I'm getting outreach from constituents who are in the Middle East right now. I'm getting outreach from constituents who are family members are stuck in Dubai and the State Department is telling them we have no way to help you or get you out. I mean, this is a catastrophic situation that was clearly done with no plan for either the safety of Americans or the safety of Iranian civilians as well. That's a very powerful answer. And I want to just kind of follow up on this point about the lack of plan and some of the concerning things we're seeing, because, you know, already you've seen Trump give these kind of shifting rationales, like, this is for freedom and the Iranian people should rise up, or I just want to do Venezuela and find someone in the regime, essentially. And that's a mixed message, right? If you're an Iranian, do you choose to rise up? But then what? Does Trump have your back or not? And then this reporting. I mean, it's kind of the worst possible strategy. Arming ethnic minority groups, whether they be Kurdish, and that seems like where it's starting. There's a Baloch separatists, potentially Arab populations. I mean, that, look at Syria and Lebanon, right? Look at Iraq. And my question, when you talk to, you mentioned maybe being in touch with people in the country, or people who are very happy that the Supreme Leader's gone, are they aware of these risks? And how do they think they can be avoided? Like, do you have a sense that people, particularly inside of Iran, but even some of the people who are very active outside, have any, have their own plan of how this is going to end well? Because I honestly, truly cannot find it. You know, I don't mean to be so pessimistic, but I just can't see the pathway to something that is not either really violent or really repressive. I think like any population, you know, Iranians aren't a monolith. There's a wide range of views right now. I think there's the most common thread that I have heard is a mix of hope for the first time ever, I guess, you know, there's no doubt that getting rid of the upper echelon of the Islamic Republic is a massive win and considered something to be hopeful about. But I think that's coupled with fear and a sense of anxiety about the future, you know, especially as bombs are falling, especially as news comes out about, you know, the arming of groups, because a big fear that is the separation, the end of territorial integrity of the country. People want to keep Iran as Iran, as opposed to the country breaking up into different factions. And that's something that's very important to people from all backgrounds, but that's a real risk when you start arming different, you know, groups. And, you know, but again, I will just say there's, at this moment, there's people who are, are happy about what Trump did. But my fear is that without a real plan, that will shift. And I have not seen that real plan. And I also just want to speak to, you know, all the different factions at play. There are, you know, during the protests a couple of weeks ago, you saw people chanting the name of the former king, the crown prince, who does have a lot of support in Iran and outside of Iran. But if you look to Donald Trump's words, every time he's been asked, he does not, back the crown prince. Just today, he said, I don't, I think he seems like a nice guy. But, you know, there may be someone inside the country. And so every like piece of evidence that you look at and what he said, Donald Trump is looking either at finding someone within the current regime apparatus that he can work with, that he can cut a deal with and call it a win, which is not what Iranians want, or arm these different groups, cause chaos and essentially have state collapse, which will lead to violence, not just in Iran, but in the region for years to come. Oh, yeah. Years and years and years. I mean, this, if this goes bad, it could go very bad. Yeah. And his words about Reza Pahlavi are kind of like, you know, how he talked about Maria Machado after, you know, taking out Maduro. This is not someone who's going to expend a lot of effort to try to have a transition to some democratic entity or even monarchical entity led by Reza Pahlavi, as far as I can see. I want to also just ask you about Congress and what are the next steps there? So we have these potential war power votes in the House, you know, where O'Connor and Thomas Massey have this resolution that is essentially about, you know, forcing a vote for a congressional authorization. What are the chances of that passing? And if not, it seems like it might not. What are the other things that Congress can do to try to get some control over this, try to rein Trump in, try to hold them at least accountable in terms of information? What's kind of the game plan as you see it now? Well, in the conversations I've been a part of with our entire caucus, I'm pleased to see that democratic leadership is taking this vote very seriously. They are, you know, whipping on it and urging all members to vote for the war powers resolution because it's, again, even for those individuals who may support certain parts of the operation, and that's a whole different debate. What this is very clearly is support of the Constitution and support of reigning in the president who has consistently shredded the Constitution. A lot of us take this very seriously. And so, you know, I'll just say from my personal experience, even just from the last year, this is one of the top times I've seen a lot of alignment and a need, a desire from folks in our caucus to be united on this, because we know there's already a couple of Republicans who will be joining us and feel strongly about this as well. So I'm cautiously optimistic. I also think the situation is developing so rapidly. We've had more Americans die, now absolute chaos with the State Department and an American stuck in the Middle East. So I hope that those Democrats who were saying, were thinking of not voting for it, recognize that now, and who knows what will happen in the next 24 hours as well. So there's that. And then the DHS funding debate is still ongoing. And how that relates is Republicans are trying to now make the argument that because of the threats potentially to the homeland that they have caused with this reckless war, that they, the Democrats need to get on board and fund DHS. And so there's a bill now to actually separate ICE from everything else and DHS, and we'll see if any Republicans support that. But there's leverage elsewhere. But again, I genuinely hope I'm wrong. I really want, when I go to the- I'm going to be asking about the plan, especially as it pertains to the reports of arming these groups, because I think that's an absolutely horrific idea. And what the US actually should be doing, if we're serious, is working with a multilateral coalition, trying to have internationally monitored free and fair elections, actually supporting civil society groups on the ground, providing internet access, actually creating the conditions for the Iranian people to have this war. So I'm going to be asking about the plan, especially as it pertains to the reports of arming these groups. So I'm going to be asking about the plan, especially as it pertains to the reports , of arming these groups. So I'm going to be asking about the plan, especially as it pertains to the reports , end that war, no off-ramp that we have heard of. And meanwhile, Americans continue to struggle and be unable to afford anything, really. It's really shameful. And I think that it's going to cause real further racism of Americans against Iranians, against people from the Middle East. I mean, we haven't even gotten to talking about those unintended consequences that are bound to happen, especially as we're going into this in a form that's not even popular. I mean, people don't even want to do this. So they're coming, people, Americans are not supporting this. So they're going to feel strongly about the individuals or whatever that they see as connected to the deaths of Americans. Yeah, boy, I had not really wrapped my mind around that. But we've obviously seen that happen in the past. Well, one more question before you go. you go. I just want to, because I know you have a briefing, but I just want to give you the opportunity to reflect on, you know, your parents flee this country. So you're obviously in this position where, you know, you have their exile story, and then your very American story, obviously. But what do you, when you think about, because I know you were so passionate about the Women's Life Freedom Movement, you know, you're in your 30s. When you think about an Iranian woman in their 30s, who's never known anything but the Islamic Republic, and is now dealing with this, you know, they're in Tehran, they just, you know, wherever they are. I mean, what do you want? I put into words, like, I just imagine, Yasmeen, that this must have just be such a wrenching time for you. You're under all these competing kind of pressures, obviously, but just more fundamentally on a human level. Um, what is kind of your message to that Iranian woman about what we want for her? Yeah, I think about this all the time. You know, the only difference between me and that woman that you're describing is that I was lucky enough to have been born in the United States. And lucky enough, that's it. I mean, that's actually all it is, is the difference. And it is catastrophic, what Iranian women in particular have had to face. I mean, there have been, over a decade now of pro-democracy movements that have been shut down over and over again by this regime. I wrote my college essay about the Green Movement in 2009. And a hopeful, you know, vision for a future democratic Iran. The most recent massacre, you know, it's estimated that over 20,000 people were murdered. And so, first, I'll say I understand the, the, the desperation and the calls for help. I do think that other countries should help Iranians. I absolutely think that. I mean, I think there needs to be on a multilateral coalition that, that has a real plan to help Iranian people with self-determination and getting the future that they deserve. Because it's a country of 90 million people, smart, educated, you know, talented individuals who could bring so much, prosperity to the rest of the world. And so much, you know, just so many positive things that it would be a huge, huge win for international security overall. So I, you know, I think for those women, keep speaking up and speaking out. And if there's ways to, you know, communicate with us, I think that our government, what we actually should be doing is supporting internet access, making sure that you can get on the internet and communicate to us, making sure that civil society groups and human rights groups are supported. Right now, there's also thousands of people in Evin prison, which is like the most notorious prison in Iran, some of the best and brightest minds. Those are the people that we need to get out to help create the future of Iran. I don't think it should be imposed from the outside. But I will do, you know, anything I can look, despite being opposed to this administration and its lawlessness and its anti-democratic views here in the U.S., if I can be productive and do anything to support a plan to actually have a positive future for Iran, I will work with anyone to do that. And I am committed to that. So that's my message. Yeah, well, it's very powerful. And it's a reminder that we need to listen to those Iranians. You know, I mean, we didn't listen to Afghans. We didn't listen to Iraqis. You know, we didn't listen to Libyans in the country, actually. Diaspora, Libyans. And not saying there's not a role for the diaspora, but I mean, the people in the country know best what might help. And we have to find ways to get their voices to us so that we're informed by them. Well, look, I know you have to run, but thanks so much for joining us today. And we'll keep in touch. Thanks so much. Thanks to Kargis from Nassari for joining the show. And God knows when we'll talk to you guys next. Yeah. Thanks to Michael for listening to the hour of the Alexis. Uh, you know, Patel or whatever her name is. What happened to Liz Trust? She was in LA. We couldn't book her. We tried to book her. No, you guys didn't seem excited. Oh, oh, oh, oh, I guess we're to blame. Yeah, we are. Liz Trust not being on the show this week. I got it. Okay. Good to know. Got it. Well, talk to you soon. We'll see you probably before next week. Yeah, unfortunately. Pod Save the World is a Crooked Media production. Our senior producer is Alona Minkowski. Our producer is Michael Goldsmith. Our associate producer is Anisha Banerjee. We get production support from Saul Rubin. Our executive producers are me, Tommy Vitor, and Ben Rhodes. The show is engineered, mixed, and edited by Jordan Cantor. Audio support by Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Thank you to our digital team, Ben Hefcote, Mia Kelman, William Jones, David Tolles, and Ryan Young. Matt DeGroat is our head of production. Adrian Hill is our senior vice president of news and politics. If you want to listen to Pod Save the World ad-free and get access to exclusive podcasts, go to crooked.com slash friends to subscribe on Supercast, Substack, YouTube, or Apple Podcasts. 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