Trump holds off 'planned' Iran attack amid 'serious negotiations'

[0:00] President Trump says he's holding off on a planned military attack in Iran that he says he was [0:05] planning to launch tomorrow. The president's saying that serious negotiations are happening [0:08] now. Let's get right to CNN's Kristen Holmes at the White House. Kristen, what are you hearing [0:12] about this? Has there been a substantial shift in the tenor of negotiations? Well, that's really [0:20] what's unclear at this moment, particularly given that we were just learning from a U.S. official [0:24] that the U.S. does not believe that Iran's latest proposal goes far enough, that Iran has made [0:30] enough concessions, particularly when it comes to enriching uranium. But what we're hearing now is [0:35] President Trump essentially saying that his Gulf country partners, including Qatar, Saudi Arabia, [0:42] and the United Arab Emirates, have essentially asked him to hold off on this planned military [0:47] attack that he says was scheduled for tomorrow. And this is the quote, in that serious negotiations [0:53] are now taking place, in that in their opinion, as great leaders and allies, a deal will be made [0:59] which will be very acceptable to the United States of America, as well as countries in [1:05] the Middle East and beyond. Then it goes on to talk about no nuclear weapons. And then [1:09] it goes on to say that he's instructed his department of, et cetera, that he will not be doing the [1:14] scheduled attack. But I do want to read one line. It says, I have further instructed them [1:18] to prepare to go forward with a full large scale assault of Iran on a notice in the event [1:24] that an acceptable deal is not reached. Now, of course, we have been reporting that President Trump [1:28] has been growing increasingly frustrated by the negotiating that Iran is doing, essentially [1:34] feeling as though it's not moving quickly enough. I will remind you that a couple of weeks ago, [1:39] I asked President Trump if he believed Iran was slow walking this process. He said he really [1:43] wasn't sure at that point. But that was still weeks ago. And we seem to be in the exact same place. [1:49] And this is also happening as President Trump has expressed this frustration to aides, [1:53] to U.S. officials as well. It's not just about the negotiating, but it's also about the Strait of [1:59] Hormuz and this extended closure, which is having a ripple effect throughout the global economy, [2:05] the global oil industry, and, of course, sending prices here in America skyrocketing. [2:09] There is a real concern that gas could go above $5 a gallon in some places. So right now, [2:15] we are hearing President Trump saying that he's having these conversations with these Middle East [2:19] partners that they're telling him to hold off. We've heard this kind of thing before, [2:24] where he says he's not going to do something because there's a peace deal in the works. It's [2:29] just unclear now what is happening behind the scenes in the moments after they're telling us [2:34] one thing, that this latest deal didn't go far enough. And this post, which came again moments [2:40] later with President Trump saying, we're going to not attack because there's a deal that might take [2:46] place soon. Yeah, a deal will be made. That is their opinion, meaning Qatar and Saudi Arabia, [2:53] according to this post. Kristen, thank you so much. Let's bring in former Republican Congressman [2:57] of Illinois, Adam Kinzinger. He's back now with reaction on this. The president has this habit of [3:03] making these threats about essentially, not even essentially, about destroying Iran and then not [3:08] following through on them. There's obviously questions about whether he should have made the [3:12] threats in the first place, but I wonder what your reaction is to him again finding an off-ramp [3:16] from his threat. Yeah, that's the whole thing. This is so damaging. You know, regardless of, [3:25] let's just be, you know, agnostic on whether he should attack again or not for the moment. [3:29] When you make threats and then you're eager to back down from those threats, which he has been [3:33] every single time. I mean, he's gone from, we will destroy an entire civilization to, we have a deal, [3:39] which we never actually had, by the way, claiming the straits open, claiming it's closed, [3:44] claiming he was going to pull the trigger on May 19th. And now everybody wants him to deal because [3:48] we're about to, like, you lose all of your strategic, like, strength. One of the greatest [3:55] things the United States had is our ability to say we will do something. The enemy knows that. And then [4:02] hopefully we won't have to do that. This has just been like threat back off, threat back off. And I [4:08] haven't seen the Iranians move in any way here. And we find ourselves in the worst case scenario, [4:14] which is a closed strait, this nebulous future. And gas is now having to price in and futures are [4:21] pricing in the uncertainty. I wonder if you think that there is a path for the U.S. to somehow exit [4:28] this situation in a better position than it went in. Is the only way out of this essentially to [4:35] have this new Persian Gulf Strait authority that Iran has installed in the Strait of Hormuz [4:41] intact and to essentially find some form of concession that Iran will accept in order to [4:51] reopen the strait to their liking? Yeah, I mean, that's what's crazy is we did go in with [4:57] overwhelming military power. And now in the White House, they are trying to figure out what Iran [5:03] needs to be satiated, to be pleased. And I mean, this is why they should have thought this through. [5:09] You either, if you're going to do something like attack Iran, you have to know what the [5:13] contingencies are. And honestly, those contingencies, you have to be willing to do them. Otherwise, [5:18] you probably should not have gone to this fight in the first place. And so what does the future here [5:23] look like? You know, I don't know. Are they going to find something that Iran wants? Maybe. Are they [5:28] going to actually denuclearize them or whatever? I don't know. Is there going to be an Iranian, [5:34] you know, toll on every ship that passes? But I know this much. I know that my kid, [5:39] who's four and a half years old, is going to probably be in a country that has a worse situation [5:45] based on what's going on because of this war than had we done nothing. I think Donald Trump needs to [5:50] figure out if we resume hostilities with Iran, you need to have a plan in place to reopen that strait [5:57] and stick to the use of the military until it's done or quit these threats because it's just making [6:03] it worse. Tomorrow marks 80 days since the U.S. and Israel launched the war with Iran. But today, [6:09] how it ends is anything but clear. Iran says it did send a new response to Pakistani mediators [6:14] about U.S. criticisms of its latest 14-point peace proposal. President Trump rejected that offer [6:21] last week, saying he stopped reading it after the first sentence. Impatient over the impasse, [6:27] the president is again threatening to destroy Iran, saying on Sunday, quote, [6:32] the clock is ticking and they better get moving fast or there won't be anything left of them. [6:37] Let's talk more about all of this with Democratic Congressman Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey. He's a [6:42] member of the House Intelligence Committee. Congressman, thank you so much for being with us. [6:46] We've seen threats like this before. Do you think the president is ready to make good on this threat [6:53] this time? Well, obviously, I won't predict what Donald Trump's going to do, but he did say that [7:00] he's going to be meeting with his natural security team in the Situation Room tomorrow. We also know [7:06] what appears to be the response to the latest from Iran on a proposed deal, which seems like, [7:14] according to reports, more words and not a lot of substantive action on their nuclear program. [7:20] So between, you know, obviously what we're looking for, the progress we're looking for from Iran [7:24] on their nuclear program, plus lack of action on scaling back their ballistic program or their terror [7:32] programs from, you know, one of our key enemies, the regime there, it seems to put forth a lot of [7:38] question marks about Iran taking things seriously when it comes to action on our side. And add to [7:45] that what's going on in the Straits, Hormuz, where you're looking at 1,000 ships or so that are still [7:50] stranded there, stuck there, which, of course, is leading to much higher gas prices for Americans [7:57] back home. In Jersey, where I live, averaged now $4.50 as we headed tomorrow day weekend, right? [8:03] You could imagine that's weighing pretty heavily. On the closure of the strait, Iran has launched [8:08] this new entity, the Persian Gulf Strait Authority, to manage the strait as they're trying to really [8:14] cement their control over this critical passageway. Is it possible that Iran retains control of the [8:21] strait in perpetuity? And certainly it appears they're going to try to do that for several months [8:29] here in the near term. Is there any scenario where that could go on in perpetuity? [8:35] I mean, I don't think that's anything that we could accept as a country. You can't have [8:40] more 20 percent of the world's oil passing through this key artery, one of our top adversaries holding [8:47] the keys, right? That seems unacceptable to me, you know, both in terms of what that would do to [8:52] global oil pricing and also impact on our allies as well. You know, let's remember what we're dealing [8:59] with here. The Iranian regime flies under the banner of death to America, calls us the great [9:04] Satan America, and has attacked and killed our service members and attacked our bases, killed [9:10] our allies. These are no friends of the United States of America. But what's been continuing to [9:16] be unclear is what our ultimate strategy is in the region and what our progress has been through the [9:22] conflict. You know, as much as I want to crush Iran, I also want to understand what our goals are. [9:27] And so far, what we're seeing is very high oil prices. And at least according to public reporting, [9:32] you know, still maintaining, Iran still maintains massive missile and drone capabilities and capacity, [9:40] as well as significant nuclear capacity, and has the resources, you know, and I think this is a big [9:47] issue, whether they have the resources to fund their proxy terrorist program, Hamas, Hezbollah, [9:53] Palestinian Islamic Jihad. So you have a lot of questions that are still hanging out there, [9:58] not a lot of answers. But we'll see what's next. The Iranians appear right now not to be [10:05] concerned about our threats.