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Over the course of these last two days, we've been reporting on these significant strikes on Iran, the fallout from them in the region and yes here in the United States, and again that latest headline crossing the Bloomberg terminal. Three service members killed in action, five have been wounded in On that note, I want to bring in Mark Warner, the Senator from Virginia, the ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, whojoins us on this Sunday morning, and sir,
I have to start there. We heard the President warn that this could be something that might happen as a result of these strikes. Your reaction to this news on this Sunday that there have been casualties as a result of these strikes.
I'm heartbroken for the families.
I know our military will always perform exquisitely. The President warned there would be these potential for casualties. This is but it begs the bigger question, why did the President choose to start this war?
And what are its goals?
I mean, a week ago we heard the administration talk about stopping Iran's nuclear program, which, by the way, the President claimed had been obliterated seven months ago. Then we heard the president's people talk about Iran's ballistic missile capability, ability to shoot missiles at our basis or into Israel, and now it's.
Evolved into regime change.
So what I know as a member of the Gang of Eight on the Intelligence Committee that there was no imminent threat to America.
So what are his goals?
He owes it to not only the families as those three, to cease service members, there will unfortunately probably be more. He needs to make the case when you start a war of choice, why it was so critical and is the goal Around's nuclear capability? Is it's the ballistic missiles, regime change, And let me acknowledge the fact that the Iranian leadership, the Supreme Leader's taken out.
I mean that is good news. I mean, this regime is awful.
But I can tell you from the intelligence standpoint, we don't have great visibility about who or what comes next. So there is a very high probability that you could have and more violent Iranian leadership come in and replace the current leaders. You could have somebody that's even more
brutal to the Iranian people. And now that the president is called on the Iranian people to rise up, and if they do rise up and they are suddenly butchered by the Iranian regime, do we owe an obligation to go in on the ground and protect the Iranian people. This is why our system says before a president chooses to go to war, you got to get a declaration, You've got to get make the case of the American people.
You've got to ask Congress. None of that took place as he chose to start this war Friday night.
So snat ward two that point, I mean, we did hear the president use war in his speech, which is a power of Congress, not of the presidency. In your opinion, was this an illegal Act.
I will allow others to debate legality.
What I do know is that the Constitution is clear that when you go to war, the president has to come before Congress. We don't have We're not in a country where there is a single monarchical leader. We are a democracy with co equal branches of government, and the people's representatives, which are the House and the Senate, need to weigh in, particularly as we now have crossed the
line into American casualties. And again, our history of wars in the Middle East, at least in the last fifty years is.
Not great.
And again the president promised his supporters that he wouldn't
get into a bunch of wars. This president has taken eight different military actions in his second term, and ironically as well, just a quick point out that when the Iranian people rose up in early January and there were literally hundreds of thousands on the street, the president set at that point he might want to back those people, but he was unable to because the military assets that should have been in the region were part of the aircraft carry in particular, was off the coast of Venezuela
on another one of his military forays, and the European allies that would normally be with US helping put pressure on the Iranian regime were appropriately focused on the President's I think crazy folly about trying to take over Greenland.
So the idea that America is going into this conflict with potentially only Israel I know there are some indications of other nations flying, but it sure as heck not the coalition of the willing that could have been brought to bear if the President had made the case of why now and why this was inevitable.
The now late Supreme Leader warned in the run up to all of this that if there were strikes, there would be a regional war that would develop. You were one of only a handful of lawmakers who have been briefed by this administration.
You remember the so called Gang of Eight.
He received a briefing, as we understand it, on Tuesday around the State of the Union from the Secretary of State Marco Rubio. I'm very curious how what you were briefed on forecasted what has come to pass here in the days that have followed from what we've seen here, the way that this is widened, the prospects of this lasting not just days, but maybe weeks or longer. Was something that the administration seemed to have weighed going into that briefing, that you had a few this and.
Was that discussed in the briefing.
Yeah, I can't go into what was discussed in the briefing. I can't say that there were a series of options. At that point the President had not made a decision.
I was Do you believe that, sir?
Do you believe the President had really not made a decision at that point.
I will accept the word of Secretary Rubio. I was recontacted on Friday, But the idea of what was driving this was it our timeline was at Israel's timeline. You know, I have a lot of questions about and there were clear questions raised by many about what happens the day after, the week after, the month after. I never got an answer to any of those questions, and quite honestly, I don't believe anyone, even in the administration knows the answer to what happens next. We do not have that great
of visibility into Iran. This is again where the Israelis do. But this is where if we had not burned so many of our relationships with our European allies who do have a diplomatic presence in Tehran, more people in country, I think we might have had a better visibility about what the opposition looks like. It appears to me that the opposition, while widespread, is not organized in a classic sense. So I'm not sure the president says rise up and
take over. I'm not sure who would rise The people might rise up, but where is the leadership that takeover when I think the more likely scenario may be that you even get further hardliners that are going to be even more brutal to the Iranian people and may then take their proxies all across the region and strike at American interest and just to go a.
Little bit even further.
You know, we have cash battel that the FBI distracted flying around the country. We have the Director of National Intelligence, Tolsey Gabbard, obsessed about reltigating.
The twenty twenty elections.
You know, what are we doing to make sure that Iranian proxies potentially in our country or people inspired by Iran or this war aren't going to take actions in the home land.
I hope that was factored in as well.
You bring up Venezuela, and I think a lot of people cautioned ust after that effort to remove the present getting Madurou out of Venezuela, that it was not a good analogy to look at what might happen in Iran. But there is the kind of similar sense of vacuum here, unwillingness of the administration, the Congress, the country to get involved on the ground in a place like that. We see how that's played out in Venezuela. Effectively, there's been a shuffle of leadership, but a lot of the structure
remains in place. What do you make of the presidence entreaty to Iranians that they should kind of make this happen on their own. There have been these air strikes. What are going to be or what could be the forcing factors that do lead to some kind of leadership change. They're barring having US forces or others there to encourage that happening on the ground.
Well, my fear is that the president.
Because the military executed the Maduro operation so brilliantly and the bombing of the Iranian nuclear facilities was carried off extraordinarily, well, it obviously didn't obliterate their program since they were trying to reconstitute. But again it was done in a relatively painless way. My fear is that the President thought, well, that was easy, let me do this again in Iran.
I think most of the intelligence.
Would overwhelmingly say that will not be as easy.
In Iran.
There's not an organized opposition the way there was in Venezuela, the single strike against a single facility back in June, our bombers took off. But the idea of calling on the Iranian people to rise up, if they rise up and they are brutally murdered by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard forces, what obligations does America hold to those Iranians who are responding to the President's call.
I don't think.
I don't know the answer to that, and I think again it's incumbent upon the President to tell the American people.
On this morning, we learned that three service members have been killed in action, five wounded. We have earstlive underline of the European Commission warning that the risk of further escalation is real. Great to spend some time here with the ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, Thank you very much for your time and for joining us on Bloomberg this weekend. Stay with
us for more on Bloomberg this weekend. Right after this, where do you hear from a pair of lawmakers now members of the House of Representative.
You might not know this.
Christina born and raised in Colorado. I was born in Boulder. We were insistent we get somebody from the centennial state here as our guest this hour. Jason Crowe, of course, Democratic congressman from Aurora and its surrounding environs, joins us. Now he sits on the Armed Services and Intelligence committees. Congressman crow great to have you with us here on this Sunday morning. And I look at the statement that you issued after these strikes became public. You said, the
administration owes Congress and Americans' answers. Have you gotten more here over these last few hours? And we've seen reports this morning if there's going to be a wider briefing of lawmakers, including members of your committees in the hour to come, can you confirm that? And what are you hoping to hear from this administration?
Good to join fellow Colorado's and the answer is, we haven't got any answers. And that's a problem, a huge problem for me. This is about accountability. Right We spent over twenty years of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. We spent trillions of taxpayer dollars, thousands of American lives, tens of thousands of others who bear the visible and invisible scars and burdens of those wars. They ended poorly, and that's I think because we stopped debating it. We financed
it with debt. There weren't votes, there wasn't an accountability loop, and that continues today. We started that same cycle again of conflict after conflict, without real debate and without a real decision by the American people about whether or not this is in their best interest. So we're going to keep on pushing the Department of Defense and the Administration
for answers for engagement. My imediate question right now is what are we doing to protect our troops, the tens of thouss of Americans who are serving in that region, who are coming under tremendous assault by missiles and drones, and what are we doing to protect that force?
Congress from the other what are we doing question? I've been getting a lot from folks in the last twenty four hours, is what is Congress doing? And I know there is an upcoming vote. I know Democrats are trying to move it forward on the War Powers Act. Even if that resolution is upheld, does Congress really realistically have the power to stop this particular president from doing whatever he wants to do militarily?
We do have the power. The question is, as you point out, are you willing to take it right? We're going to force a vote on Wednesday so that people have to stand up and let their constituents know where they stand on this issue. You know, thumbs up, thumbs down, right, So we need to start taking a role, taking names, and that's the beginning of that accountability process that I was talking about. But Congress has all sorts of power if it is willing to use it appropriations, pulling money,
pulling funding, putting guardrails on deployments. Congress actually can do all of those things. The problem is not whether or not it has the power. The problem has been in my time in Congress, it's unwillingness to use it, which is not just our responsibility, but it's actually our duty to do that, to take that power back and to put those guardrails in place. So in all of this, the question is not whether or not the Iranian regime was that it was a terror regime, it was awful.
All of those things are true, right, This was a terrible rogue terrorists supporting regime, It killed American soldiers, destabilized the entire Middle Eastern region. All of those things are true. The question is whether or not this is the right response, whether or not we should be spending tens of billions of US dollars, whether or not regime change is something we should be engaged in, and whether it's going to actually turn out better for us in the end.
Earlier this morning, we spoke with Eric Watson, our colleague wo covers the Capitol. In no doubt he's asked you some pressing questions over the course of your career or in Congress, and gazing into his crystal ball, he expressed some He suggested that perhaps this war resolution isn't going to pass, that Democrats are too divided on this issue.
I'm curious, when you look at your caucus, do you think that it is going to be a piece of legislation that gets the wide majority supportive Democrats in the House.
I do think we're going to get a lot of support for it. I even think some Republicans are going to vote for it. I don't think we're all that divided on this issue. And people have different views on regime change in Iran, but we are pretty united on this issue of Congress retaking its war powers. Right, Because regardless of what you think about any about any one particular instance Venezuela, Sudan, Iran, Ukraine, what remains true is that the American people, Americans really want there to be
checks and guardrails put in place. They're very tired of no debate, no public discussion, no votes, no accountability on all these conflicts.
Right.
They actually want us to be thinking about what we're doing long term and whether or not it is in their core interest. Is it making groceries cheaper? Is it protecting them? Is it keeping their families safe? Is it reducing the cost of health care? Is it helping them afford homes? That is the discussion in the debate that has not been happening, and that has to happen, and that we're going to.
Force to pivot to exactly what you were talking about. And that's because we do have a midterm coming up, and all politics are local. Do you think this is a liability for the president the longer this conflict continues, because even in his world there is division about this American expansion as in the Don Roa doctrine. Is this something that Democrats are going to hit hard against their Republican opponents come the midterms?
Absolutely? You know, I don't Trump realize something on the campaign trail, something that I know deeply, and that is there is a lot of anger and resentment in working class America where I'm from, the people that I grew up with and the people that I served with and I fought with when I went to war in Iraq and Afghanistan three times times. People are angry with this lack of accountability by endless conflict and it not delivering
for them. So he actually campaigned as an isolationist. He campaigned to end these wars and to end this constant cycle of conflict, and now that he's in power, he's just perpetuating the same thing. Right, seven countries bombed in the first year alone, tens of billions of dollars spent on these operations, where a lot of Americans are saying, what are we doing. What are we accomplishing here? What is the endgame?
Right?
Because Iraq and Afghanistan, Afghanistan was the same thing. Right, we won. Here's an important point. We won every single battle in the wars in Iraq in Afghanistan. We didn't lose a single engagement, a single battle. We won all of them.
Right.
But we lost the wars in the end, right, It's because we didn't have a strategy, We didn't articulate what our interests were and what we were doing, and we didn't have an endgame. Right, And we're in the same situation here now again, and people are pretty fed up with it.
Yeah.
I do believe this is going to blow back on the President, and we're going to see who's willing to stand up and try to end the cycle of madness versus those who are going to perpetuate it.
Harkson Jason Crowe joining us on this Sunday head of that briefing he's scheduled to get from the Administration and that vote on war powers in the House later this week Wednesday.
Stay with us for more on Bloomberg this weekend. Right after this, we're going to turn now to the Great State of Texas and Representative Mike McCall. He, of course, serves on the Foreign Affairs and Homeland Security Committees and is the Chairman Ameritus of Foreign Affairs. Congress than, thank you so much for joining us. I know you're having a busy day. I believe we are your inaugural zoom
interview on television. We are very very grateful for that, and thank you to those who helped make this happen. But I didn't know if you could here, Congressman Crow his criticism towards the end, there is that in this campaign there's no strategy and there's no endgame. What is the president's strategy in Iran? Do you understand what it is and do you support it?
Well, first, it's great to be on your inaugural Sunday show. Thank you. You know, I think, look, the presidents trying to negotiate, just like Maduro, the Iranians are very deceptive. They're not good faith negotiators. I believe in his mind he knew at the end of the day couldn't trust them, and he went.
To Plan B.
This was what was interesting to me is the targets. It was no longer about inviscerting the nuclear sites, but rather going into regime change. I mean to see the compound of the Isola just completely blown up. And we know that not only was he taken out of his top advisors and the IRGC, this was a significant event and I don't want to diminish the sort of greatness
of this moment. Since in nineteen seventy nine, there's been a dark veil that descended across the Middle East, and that shroud has now been lifted and the people of Iran now have a chance for freedom and a chance to take back their country. And since nineteen seventy nine, we've seen what Iran has done as the largest state sponsor of terror. You know, they've had their proxies and it's not just Israel. Everybody talks all about Israel. They
also send drones to kill Ukrainians. They also fuel China's imperial war war machine. And you know what's interesting, lastly, Christina is you know the typical allies here. They have completely turned off the Gold States from them. I mean, with this miscalculation of hitting not only our military bases but hotels in the Gulf States surrounding Iran. They are now aligned with the United States and Israel against Iran, and where is China and Russia? They're nowhere to be found.
So I understand a veterans standpoint Iraq Afghanistan. I understand all that. The difference is Iran is all alone now and there's no one there to save them, and their leadership is completely decapitated such that there's no serious governance that can take place. I do think it's time for the people rise up. I think the big question for me is what do we have in place to help these people?
Right?
So, what is Israel doing?
Let me go there if I could, because that's my question of the morning, which is the government maybe out? You have this vacuum. How does the US encourage that to happen here without boots on the ground, which I think, dare I say you and others in the Congress are probably reluctant to have be the case going forward here? How does the US and Israel encourage the growth of a new administration, new government in Iran? Barring that?
That's a great question. I think it is the question of the hour. I think we got us in trouble in Iraq. If I can go back to Iraq, in Afghanistan, we had a chance to kill Ben Laanen early on, and we missed him. Here we did, we killed the Ayatola. He has gone. Our presence there voked to the Jahadas. So it was our boots on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistian that drew like a magnet. The jahadis to us,
We're not going to see that in this case. And I have to think that Israel is probably the one in the best position to effectuate, you know, help with not only communications but weapons and leadership, and those are the three elements I talk about a lot. I don't know who the next leader of Iran's going to be. I don't see weapons right now, but that's possible. In the communications, we got to get star Link in there. I know they were trying to, but Iran was taking
out those you know, those terminals. I think that's going to be a big change when Starling gets back up and they can communicate amongst themselves.
Now.
I remember the last strike in the day or the ten day War or whatever it was that, you know, I was surprised at what the presence of the assets Israel had on the ground in Ron to take out these targets. Yeah, and I think everyone in the intelligence community was equally surprised by the presence they had. So I do think Israel's probably in the better position. If it does need boots on the ground, certainly Israel's better. I don't see this present putting American boots on the ground.
Chustin.
I want to ask you, there's been some reporting that members of Congress are going to be getting some briefings, maybe as soon as today or tomorrow. I'm wondering if there's anything you can say about that. What briefings are information you've received from the White House so far. And then I also want to ask you about this War Powers resolution that some of your colleagues are trying to send to the floor, and whether or not you're supported.
Sure, so a couple of things, More Powers Act has been invoked. This was a military the use of our military in the foreign land in a strike situation. So that prong has been fulfilled. Therefore, within forty eight hours of notification has to come to the Congress notifying us of the circumstances, the legal justification, and the extent and duration of the conflict. If the conflict exceeds sixty days, it needs authorization from Congress. Now Congress can do that
prior typically it has not in the past. We do have briefings scheduled this week that will be classified briefings in what's called the skiff, that's a classified briefing space.
Information will you be looking for in those briefings? What questions do you have for the administration?
I think for me next steps? Look, this was once again, like Venezuela, a masterful military executed plan, flawless, no Americans that were killed. What I'm looking for is what's the overall objective moving forward. It's clearly not just taking out military sites now it's about regime change, and I would like to know what objectives are in hand and what is what are the next steps in place? And how
long we're all all involvement take place? If I can say, as Chairman of Foreign Affairs Committee, I was trying to update these old aumfs from the two thousand and one. Yeah, Jason Crow is part of the thing. The sticking point, Christina was I couldn't get the left or the right to agree to add Iran and their proxies on to the two.
Thousand Conerson, we got to go.
I'm so sorry, thank you so much for taking time with us. We really appreciate it.
Stay with us for more on Bloomberg this weekend. Right after this, we're talking.
A lot about politics, yes here in the US, the fallout from these strikes over the weekend, of politics in the region in Iran as well. And I want to bring in to Garshimali, formerly of the US Mission to the UN, now affiliated with the Atlantic Council and with Columbia University. She's here on set with us along with Joe Matthew, the anchor of Balance of Power on Jeff Mason, our White House correspondent here at Bloomberg News regard, let me.
Turn to you.
We've talked a lot about the vacuum that's erupting here, the Supreme Leader killed in these attacks and what might happen next. The President of the United States encouraging Iranians to step up and take advantage of this opportunity. How are you watching and thinking through what's happening on the ground now and what's going to film inn to perhaps lead to some major changes here and iron going forward.
Sure, well, there are three things that I'd be looking for. So first, is one for greater protests and are those protests are going to They're going to grow. We've seen a lot of Iranians celebrating in the streets. You've also seen some Iranians going at the US embassy and protesting the other way. But when when it comes to Iran, it's hard to know when they express support for the regime, if they're paid, if they're scared, or if you know how genuine it is. So one thing we'll be looking
for is protests, celebrations, how big those become. Another thing I'd be looking for is the direction of the IRGC.
So we're hearing some stories.
And I don't want to over emphasize these, but small stories of low level defections, folks that won't fire on people and such. When you have that, it's showing cracks and fissures in the IRGC. You want to see more of that to indicate that the regime is going to fall, because a dictator is only as strong as the military is loyal. Now there is no real dictator. There is a new named newly named Ayatola. But that said, there's
the leadership has been decapitated. As Representative McCall said, so hard to see what that really, what really happens there so IRGC and then the third and this is a really important one that I don't think receives enough attention except on Bloomberg, which is the economic situation which has been done yeah, super higher in Iran. In October, one of their biggest banks, Bank Ayande Bank, collapsed. It's the regime absorbed it into Bank Melli, a state run one
of the biggest lenders in Iran. They printed Rial's inflation skyrocketed. That is what precipitated the protests. And there are about five other banks that are about to face very similar situations. So when you have an implosion like that, it means the regime doesn't have an economic leg to stand on.
I want to ask you what we know about popular sentiment in Iran. It's obviously not a place that we're going to be getting very accurate or even possible pulling. So we have these two camps, if you're mentioning, we have people inside Iran who are hemmed in by not being able to speak out openly in the regime. At the moment, internet and phones I've been cut. I was talking to a friend. She hasn't talked to her family in twenty four hours. She doesn't know if they're in
the city. You just know if they're outside of the city. And you have this very vocal XPAC community, many of them in the including the Shaw's son, who has been making videos and would very much like to sweep back into power. Is that at all a possibility? Is there a third player in addition to folks inside the regime who would be naming themselves the new leader, former Shaw's son. Is there a third player in there or is that yet.
To be determined?
Now?
This yet to be to be determined. I would say so the Shaw's son, I would I'm personally loath to endorse any one person, and in particular the we're for endorsements, right, or the son of a former monarch too, right exactly.
I mean, this was not a flawless regime, and there seems to be a little retrofitting of history going on among his supporters, right.
And I could see that, you know. And I met him actually at the Munich Security Conference, and he's very well spoken, very smart. He's been in the United States since he was literally seventeen years old.
And he seems to have a.
Great vision for how things could unfold now. So, but I can't speak to I don't know if the majority of the Iranian people support him. We do know that he has some support, He has very strong support outside. He does have some support inside. But that said, he has talked about anyway that he would if if he were the one to try and install a constitutional monarchy and bring in democratic reforms, that he would bring in a very diverse group, you know, representing the diverse elements
of Iran. So there's hope there. He has met with the White House several times, but there also you can see very loath to endorse any one person, in particular Jeff Mason.
Let me ask you about what the president wants to see happen here. I'm going to go out on a limb and bet that he's been scrolling through social media as we all haven't seen these videos pop up of dubious legitimacy. Who knows if they're real or not. We have verified all of them, some of the protests and celebrations that Gar's talking about just a moment to go. What does he want exactly? What does he want this to lead to in Iran?
I don't have the answer to that, because I'm not sure that he does I'm going to say, does he have the answers exactly? I think that. I mean, it's a good question. He indicated in one of the interviews that he did that the US could sort of sweep in, or the US could wait and watch how things happen and come back back again in three years. I think he said if Iran were to pursue nuclear weapons again.
So I think it's an ambiguous answer. I think it's also interesting to compare what happened now and around versus what the US did in Venezuela, taking out the leader and then really having what seemed so far to be a pretty decent relationship with his successor, despite the fact that they went in and took out Maduro, which of course the Maduro regime and the government there was not
happy about. So big contrast there, but also big question marks in terms of what does happen next and what implications does that have for the country, for the region, and for the President Trump.
Jim Matthew, We had John Bolton on the show yesterday and he said, this is the most consequential decision of President Trump's presidency.
Do you agree with that?
Well, yes, we'll see how that goes in the next couple of weeks. I mean, I guess there could be a Venezuela version of this, but that seems to be pretty unlikely, even if everybody packed.
Up their toys and went home.
Right now, Remember the president a couple of weeks ago is really interesting following the capture of Maduro and the questions about, well, why Delsi Rodriguez and he pointed the debathification of Iraq. This is something I'd love to know who it was he was talking to the night before when that was implanted in his brain, because that was the approach there, and I wonder how that will inform what's about to happen next in Tehran?
Can you explain that to those of us who may not be completely familiar with the debatification?
Is the argument there that they did it wrong?
And this is tu one was Yes, by removing everybody that made our situation in Iraq worse. Why don't we keep the people who are there who have institutional knowledge and maybe we can have a relationship with them. But to duplicate that in Iran might be frankly impossible.
Kart, Let me draw on your past experience at the UN at the US mission to the UN, and we did see the Iranians call for a meeting of the Security Council yesterday that came to pass. We heard from Mike Waltz, the current US Ambassador to the UN, making the case they're in that body for what's happened here.
How do you think about the role of foreign leaders and international diplomats at this moment in time, as all this unfolding, and our focus is so squarely on because of the immediate danger of it, the strikes that we're seeing taking place yesterday and continuing today.
Well, but David, you're asking me at a unique moment, because, on one hand, I feel we've never seen the UN be more feckless. The Iranian ambassador went to the Unsecuity Council blatantly lied through his teeth as they as the regime often does. You saw the Secretary of General Antonio Gutirez take a few hours. It took him a few hours to come out and condemn these strikes, whereas it took him over a week to come out and condemn
the regimes of mass force against their own people. And so they're not exactly looking very credible at the moment. You also had as soon as these strikes started, you had European leaders that came out obviously against this, and they've been largely ignored, ignored and even made fun of, certainly on the internet, but by the administration as well. And so what you're seeing there that's really all a symptom of a larger situation of this, where is the
international world order going? It's you know, and I don't want to get too nerdy here, but those rules are not being respected by anybody, and so that's crumbling. You're seeing leaders try and want to exercise some kind of influence and frustrated that they can't. And so a lot of these examples of Venezuela, Iran, you're seeing the United States taking matters into their own hands because that system
is not working. And so when you see these other more middle powers, if you can call them, they are feeling irrelevant, and so they're trying and what you might see is that they later might unite and carry forward other practices of the international world order, But in the
meantime it's not going to weigh heavily. Where I would keep my eye on as the golf, because the regime is making a huge mistake is super dumb strategy to be striking countries in the golf, countries that actually implored the United States not to pursue strikes, and that's only going to pivot the golf even further to double down on the United States.
First of all, this is a safe space for nerdy, so never apologize for that. But I think you do make a good point, and that's about the international world order, something that has almost been President Trump's nemesis for as long as he's been in office, and now we see him trying to build almost a parallel structure to the United Nations with this peace or that bord of peace. Thank you, it's so basically can't.
Remember the name of it, Jeff.
But the odd thing about this is at the same time he abhors some of these multilateral uizations organizations. We've seen the US POL out of the World Health Organization. He almost never has anything nice to say about the United Nations. Why does the president still seem to want some form of legitimacy from the international community, things like the Nobel Peace Prize, a good speaking slot, a seat at the table.
Talk to us about that balance?
Well, I mean, President Trump is someone going back to his real estate days in New York, who likes to have validation, and I think that that applies to whether he's working on his business career working in his political career. That said, the sort of jekylin Hyde aspect of that is he's not someone who waits for permission. He is somebody who is absolutely taking control of the international order and reframing the United States and the world in his vision.
And that is exemplified by this attack. It's exemplified by how he's dealt with tariffs in terms of the economic world order. It's exemplified by how he's dealing with universities, law firms, the media on a domestic side in the United States. So he does all of that, but you're not wrong that he also wants to be padded on the back. And that's just kind of his mo shoe.
We got about a minuteleft.
Yeah, It's just it's an ironic sort of split screen that he talks about how many wars he has stopped when you've got Congressman Crow on the year counting how many countries he has shot lest So I'm not sure that many people are keeping score in that regard, but it is pretty remarkable. The extent to which hemispheric influence and now I guess worldwide influence is awfully important to this president who came into office elected on three big things. Right,
the economy, affordability has got an issue. There, immigration where we're running into issues, and I'll remind everybody that we have a partial government shut down still underway.
And then it was no New Wars.
Joe, of course, the acropouns power here on Bloomberg Television and Radio. Jeff Mason, our White House correspondent with us here in New York this weekend, which is a treat at Garshmolly, thank you very much for coming in. She's affiliated with the Atlanta Council with Columbia University. Of course, before that was at the US Mission to the United Nations.
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