Trump Throws Gabbard Under The Bus — Again

For the second time this week, President Donald Trump publicly undermined Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, disregarding her assessment of Iran’s nuclear capabilities.

Speaking to reporters on the tarmac after landing in Morristown, New Jersey, on Friday afternoon, Trump repeated his belief that Iran is building a nuclear weapon — and his disregard for the conclusions of Gabbard, who testified in March that Iran’s nuclear development program was not close to a bomb.

“She’s wrong,” Trump said flatly when asked about Gabbard’s assessment.

That exchange mirrored a similar statement Trump made to a reporter on Air Force One on Monday evening.

“I don’t care what she says,” he said, when asked about Gabbard’s testimony conflicting with his own assertion that Iran’s nuclear program was close to developing a bomb.

Trump has been privately frustrated with Gabbard over her posting of a video criticizing the “political elite and warmongers” for “fomenting” conflict with Iran — frustrations that spilled into public view this week as he has adopted a more hawkish view of the conflict.

The president has yet to decide whether to join Israel’s military assault on Tehran’s nuclear facilities, with press secretary Karoline Leavitt saying on Thursday that Trump planned to wait another two weeks to let things play out.

She attributed that delay to Trump’s reluctance to rule out the possibility of a diplomatic breakthrough with Iran on a deal to scale back its nuclear development.

The president underlined that point in his comments on Friday, although he said he wasn’t about to ask Israel to halt its military operation against Iran in hopes of reaching a diplomatic resolution.

"I think it's very hard to make that request right now,” Trump said. "If somebody is winning, it's a little bit harder to do than if somebody is losing, but we're ready, willing and able, and we've been speaking to Iran, and we'll see what happens."

Trump didn’t elaborate on the nature of any direct talks with Tehran.

He was also asked about his skepticism two decades earlier concerning the Bush administration’s ultimately incorrect assertions about Iraq having weapons of mass destruction that were used as a pretext for war and how the current moment is different.

"Well, there were no weapons of mass destruction. I never thought there were. And that was somewhat pre-nuclear,” Trump said, acknowledging that, as a civilian, he opposed the Iraq war.

“It was a nuclear age, but nothing like it is today,” he continued, turning back to Iran. “It looks like I'm right about the material that they've gathered already. It's a tremendous amount of material. And I think within a matter of weeks, or certainly within a matter of months, they were going to be able to have a nuclear weapon. We can't let that happen.”