Name: How divided is the Trump administration over the Iran war? | DW News
Uploaded: 2026-03-18T16:56:32.000Z
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One of Donald Trump's top counterterrorism officials resigns in protest over the war in Iran.

What does his departure tell us about divisions within the administration over the war, conservatives relationship with Israel, and

Well, Kerry, Dan is managing editor of the Cook Political Report.

That's an independent, nonpartisan newsletter that analyzes American politics.

Kerry, welcome and thanks for joining us.

But if you had to sum it up, what, if anything, does this episode surrounding this official, Joe Kent, really tell us about Trump and his supporters as briefly as you can.

To begin with, I think that Joe Kent's departure is maybe a symptom rather than a catalyst for action here.

But what we are seeing is he's the first high profile administration official to publicly break with the president's policy on Iran.

There was not an imminent threat from, from Iran.

It was very interesting to see how he worded his letter to Trump.

He sort of blamed the people around Donald Trump and the state of Israel without blaming the president directly for his decision making here.

But it does show that there are starting to be some small cracks in the president's coalition around the way that he has talked in the past about foreign wars.

He ran on the idea of avoiding foreign interventionism.

That's clearly not what's happening here.

And there are starting to be some conservative voices, Joe Kent among them, that are starting to voice their displeasure there.

All right, let's get into it further first by looking at a quote from the resignation letter that Joe Kent, the director of the National Counterterrorism center, handed in today.

He wrote, I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran.

Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation.

And it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby.

And here is how President Trump reacted to the resignation.

When I read his statement, I realized that it's a good thing that he's out because he said that Iran was not a threat.

Every country realized what a threat Iran was.

The question is whether or not they wanted to do something about it.

All right, Kerry, to begin with, what should we know about Joe Kent himself?

Well, Joe Kent is a former member of Congress.

He was serving as the head counterterrorism official in this capacity.

He's in an interesting political place right now because Democrats agree with his assessment of this being a war of choice that they don't support.

But Democrats are also very reluctant to claim him as one of their own.

They don't really want to elevate him that much.

That's because Joe Kent is primarily known for also being somebody who sort of has peddled in conspiracy theories in the past.

Yes, about Iraq, Israel, but also about January 6, the 2020 election.

So he is somebody who has sort of espoused some of these very right wing ideals.

He had previously been viewed as a very MAGA kind of acolyte.

So Democrats are very quick to say we agree with his assessment just on Iran, but

don't take him too seriously, like he's a little bit of a nut.

He's very much aligned with Tucker Carlson.

Carlson has come to his defense today and actually, Joe, Ken is going to talk to Carlson tomorrow as to further explain his reasoning here.

But he's known as sort of a right wing person, which is why him breaking with the president is making some waves here in the States.

Let's talk about the first part of Kent's given reasoning in that letter, that Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation.

There's broad agreement within the political spectrum with that assertion.

Is that fair to say or is it still sort of unknown?

Well, as of right now, the if there was evidence of an imminent threat, the American people are not particularly convinced of that, nor are many of the members of Congress who've been briefed here.

I think that there are lots of foreign policy experts and lawmakers who believe that, yes, Iran overall could be an existential threat to the United States.

But the idea that that was imminent, the idea that they are, we're very close to obtaining nuclear weapons and aiming them at the United States, we haven't really seen a justification from the administration from that.

And that's also showing up in public opinion polling.

About two thirds of Americans, when they were asked first by CBS right after this war started, has the administration made a case for what we're doing here?

We're not quite sure what exactly this is all about.

And the administration made very little effort heading into this conflict to build up support with international allies or to make a public case for why this was necessary.

So if there is evidence that there was an imminent threat, that certainly is not something that has been shared with folks behind closed doors on Capitol Hill or that the president has really tried to make a case publicly.

Do you think this puts More pressure on Trump to make that case publicly.

But what I think is a little bit problematic for the president is that there was so much different kinds of messaging from different parts of the administration early on.

He has also said that he will declare victory, sort of when he feels like it, when he senses that there is, you know, he's achieved his goals, but

so far he's really not stated what those goals are.

One thing that is particularly problematic is that Donald Trump could declare victory, say, we've done what we wanted to accomplish and we're out of there.

But there will be a persistent problem regardless, probably until there is more resolution here when it comes to gas prices, because gas prices are the way that America, the American public is feeling this.

They're not necessarily paying that much attention to what's happening on their TV screens, but

they are, when they go to fill up at the pump, feeling the results of this.

Iran has said that they are going to do everything that they can to sort of exacerbate that problem for Donald Trump.

So even if he was to declare a victory without really stating what his objectives are, the American people are probably going to still keep feeling the effects of this for weeks to come.

Joe Kent's boss, Tulsi Gabbard, the Director of National Intelligence, came out today saying that, hey, the president makes the final call supporting Trump in that case.

But it is likely that there are still rifts within the administration, that's fair to say.

And Gabbard's statement was very, very careful in that she said, President Donald Trump is the person who made, who was empowered to make this decision, and

She's also famously anti interventionist.

She's famously a member of the administration who in past campaigns has highlighted the fact that Donald Trump did not want to relive the experiences, for example, of Iraq and Afghanistan and these scars with the American public from those two foreign conflicts and how they became these, like, sort of intractable quagmires is something that she talked a lot about and that Donald Trump talked a lot about during his campaign.

Even in his first campaign, he talked about Iraq and how he would have avoided that conflict and he would have gotten us out of it.

And so that's why it's quite jarring, I think, for some conservative commentators to hear him say, this was a necessary war.

It's going to be over quickly, is the way that he has argued that that's what remains to be seen.

And I think the long this conflict goes on, the more unpopular you might see it become with the American public and specifically with Trump's coalition.

Kerry, let's talk about the second aspect of Kent's statement, and that is Israel.

First, I want to play a clip of someone who appears to be an ideological ally of Kent's.

We've already talked about him, right wing media personality Tucker Carlson.

Here's what he recently said about the war.

This happened because Israel wanted it to happen.

This war is not being waged on behalf of national security objectives to make the United States safer or richer.

This war is not actually even about weapons, mass destruction, nukes, chembio.

This war is waged purely because Israel wanted it to be waged.

That's from a flame throwing right wing personality for those who may not know Carlson.