Bulwark Takes - Trump Says Iran Is Finished—Then Asks the World for Backup

Episode Date: March 15, 2026

Sam Stein and Will Saletan take on Donald Trump’s claims that Iran has been “decimated” even as his administration asks other countries to help secure the Strait of Hormuz. They discuss the contradictions in Trump’s messaging and what it reveals about the war. They also react to FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr’s warning to broadcasters over their coverage.

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Okay, but what if I don't have an accident? Well, just keep on, keeping on. Bell Air Direct, insurance, simplified. Conditions apply. All right, hey, everybody. It's me, Sam Stein, joined by Will Salton for a special Saturday edition of Bullwork Takes. We're coming to you because President Trump just does not stop. Now that it is Brendan Carr, the FCC Commissioner, they are posting through the weekend.

ridiculous posts, illogical posts. We're going to start with the substantive stuff first and then get to Brendan Carr, which, you know, from a selfish standpoint, a media standpoint, was kind of scary. Not kind of scary. It is actually quite scary. Literally two minutes before we came on,

President Trump put up another bleat. I'm going to read it because it really does kind of shock you when you see it in print. So this is what he said. The United States of America has beaten and completely decimated Iran, both militarily, economically, and in every other way. But the countries of the world that receive oil through the Hermuz Strait must take care of that passage. And we will help a lot, exclamation point.

The U.S. will also coordinate with those countries so that everything goes quickly, smoothly, and well. There should have always been a team effort. And now it will be. It will bring the world together towards harm. Germany, security, and everlasting peace, exclamation point, President Donald J. Trump. So look, I have a couple questions here. Okay.

And then, well, maybe you can answer them. One is, if we've beaten Iran militarily and economically and the war is essentially over and our victory is complete, why the fuck do we need anyone's help with the Strait of Hormuz? Well, Sam, he's been saying this for a week that we've completely destroyed them, right? Obviously, we haven't, right? That's why those ships can't get through. But I love, I love this newfound spirit in the Trump administration. What did he say, team effort? He wants a team effort.

Team effort. Sam, can you tell me how many countries Donald Trump consulted before he decided to attack Iran? Yeah. I guess we'll count Israel. We'll count Israel. Yeah, that's one. Sorry, sorry. That is true.

We did consult. But that's it. That's it, right? And then all of a sudden, it's like everybody else is supposed to clean. up after him because we're a team. Oh, it's much worse than that, Will. We've tariffed all these countries. J.D. Vance's first appearance on the global stage as vice president was in Europe, admonishing

them. They've been, you know, not even a week ago. I want to get this one, too, because it wasn't even a week ago. He said this, the United Kingdom, our once great ally, maybe the greatest of them all, is finally giving serious thought to sending two aircraft carriers to the Middle East. That's okay, Prime Minister Starmor. We don't need them. any longer. But we will remember. We don't need people to join wars after we've already won.

This was a week ago. A week ago, he said they don't need Britain. And now today he's saying, please, come, come be part of this collaborative effort. I mean, if you're starving or you're like, screw you, man. Right? I mean, like, what is the point? Every time I think it can't get crazier, it gets crazier, right? So first of all, it is, we're going to, first of all, it starts with the insult, with Vance, with the tariffs, right? You're a threat. threatening Greenland, right? Threatening Europe, basically. You guys, you guys pay us for all the weapons for Ukraine now, all that stuff. Then it's like, we're going to go invade Iran without consulting you on our own. Then it's like, hey, you're supposed to help us. Then it's like,

you did help us, but not fast enough. So we're going to like bitch have been moan more. And then after all of that, we're at this stage where he expects them, having insulted them twice, to come in and clean up after him. So it's like five stages of just not being, a team player, being a cowboy, and then expecting everyone else to be a team player for you. And not only that, with respect to the straight of Ramuz, like, the only reason it's closed, or at least that oil is not shipping through there is because of this war, right? I mean, he did this. It's his responsibility.

Secondarily, basically what he's saying is, hey, can you send your ships and your sailors into this straight where there may or may not be mines, where you may or may not be shot, where there may or may not be boats that come and blow you up and just take one for the team. That's essentially what he's saying. And then on top of that, if you don't recall, it was like a week ago, not even a couple days ago where he was on Brian Kilmead's show. And basically he like told the sailors, he's like, you know what, have some guts. Go and do it.

Like, what happens happens, right? Like, everyone has to make sacrifices, but not us. Right. And it's sort of like, yeah, everyone else is supposed to. First of all, do we, do we show the tweet where he asked the Chinese to come in? He's like, no, that was earlier in the day. He says, he lists a bunch of countries that he thinks are supposed to come in and clean up after him. We're supposed to send ships, presumably military ships, the kind of ships that would be helpful. He includes China on this list.

Like, what the hell? You want like China to be sending military ships into the, into the Persian Gulf, into the Strait of Hormuz? I mean, that's completely crazy. Well, and that and then we, of course, East sanctions on Russia to help with the global oil supply issues. And so we're kind of bending over backwards for what should be our adversaries. Let's switch to Carr, though. I mean, obviously, what's happening in the Middle East in Iran specifically is more important. It matters. It's very difficult to see a president flail like this. And then just basically try to tell the American public, hey, everything's going fine. And he has in Brendan Carr, an aid, a very powerful aide who is basically going to threaten the media to report things a certain way that he will find

suitable. I mean, Brendan Carr has not made it, you know, a secret that he wants the broadcast news over which he has jurisdiction to report the war in a way that's favorable to the president. So here is Brendan Carr's tweet. This is difficult. I wish they just use the same fucking platform because you don't have to jump around from the truth social to the Twitter. is what Brendan Carr said. It's a long one, but I won't, I'll try to get through it quickly.

Broadcasters that are running hoaxes and news, also known as fake news, have a chance not to correct course before their license renewals come up. We could stop there for a second. That's not particularly vague. That's a threat, right? Right. Right. It's, it's the threat. It's, it's, we're going to enforce our version of the media by withholding licenses, by using the power of the state. He says, the law is clear. Broadcasters must operate in the public interest and they will, and they will lose their licenses if they do not. What's the public interest? It's whatever Donald Trump and Brennan Carr wanted to.

By the way, like this is what happens. And this is like what it's like to live in an authoritarian country. The government says we don't like what the media are reporting. We will withhold your license. Suddenly, you can't broadcast. Yeah. Okay. We're just two graphs in.

It's already dark. And frankly, changing courses in their own business interests, since trust in legacy media has now fallen to an all-time love, just 9% in our ratings disasters. The American people have subsidized broadcasters at tune of billions of dollars by providing free access to the nation's airwaves. It's very important to bring trust back into media,

which has earned itself the label of fake news. Here it gets really dark. When a political candidate is able to win a landslide election victory after in the face of hoaxes and distortions, there is something very wrong. It means the public has lost faith and confidence in the media, and we can't allow that to happen time for change. Now, I should say, this is plastered over a Trump bleak in which he goes after what he says,

the fake news for reporting that five tanker planes in Saudi Arabia had been struck down, which he says that's not really true. Four of the five didn't have really much damage. So what they're arguing about is maybe a technicality, maybe Trump's lying, who knows. But Brendan Carr is out there explicitly stating to broadcasters, correct the record or your licenses will be revoked. First of all, the media did not get this wrong. The media, the story, the Wall Street Journal story said the planes were damaged. Trump's bleat is, hey, they weren't destroyed.

They were only a little bit damaged. I mean, so like, the story was not wrong, right? No. But Sam, that last part of the Brendan Carr tweet is part. That's the upside down world. Donald Trump is a career liar. He lies more than any person that I've ever seen in public life. He then wins an election despite that.

And the FCC chairman, not just like an ordinary flunky, not Stephen Miller, the person in charge of the broadcast industry says, because this guy won the election, anyone who criticized him must be a liar. And therefore, they should not be given allowed a broadcast license because they're liars. So it's completely upside down in which based on an election result, we decide what the truth is, and then we censor accordingly. Is Brandon Carr's view that Donald Trump would have won 90% of the vote, if not for the fake media? The fake media?

I mean, is that essentially what he's saying? Like, Donald Trump is a hero. Also, what the hell, man? Like, I'm so tired of this idea that the media is leftist and that is just absolutely out to get Trump. The biggest media outlets in the country are owned by Trump sycophants. Right. I mean, they are. Twitter.

People don't. TikTok. TikTok. Absolutely. I know they're not broadcasters. I know they're not broadcasters, but let's just, I'm expanding the aperture here. The biggest media companies, the most powerful influential media companies in our country are owned by Trump sycophants. We're talking about Twitter, TikTok. Fox News is the biggest cable company in the business. And now you have CBS, which is run by Barry Weiss. I mean, you have the Alessons who are going to take over CNN. I mean, this is, what are we talking about? We just had a Pentagon briefing at which the Secretary of War renamed, said that CNN is fake news and that David Ellison, the bright wing, if I can call him that billionaire, who's already like taking over CBS, can't wait for him to take over CNN. So this is the regime, the administration, the government of the United States, calling on their oligarch friends to take over the media.

And those they don't take over will lose their broadcast license. And for people who are not aware of this, if you watch a Trump event, something in the White House or anywhere, who is asking the questions? Who is in that press pool? It's One America News, a right-wing outfit. It's Gateway Pundit. It's Lindell TV. I love Lindel TV. Don't start.

I love Lindel TV. I get my pillows and I watch my TV at the same time. It's an incredible combination. No, and then the other thing, so this is, it's very authoritative, kind of Stalinistic threats. And then the other thing is just like the, some of the requests for the coverage are so absurd, right? Like, so Carr's criticism, as you noted, it made no sense. Like, the journal story was accurate. Hegsteth at that briefing, I don't know if people really appreciated this.

He started the briefing by talking about how the United States was going to intensify operations. Lethality, unity of purpose. Those are not slogans in Iran and bring lethality, the likes of which that people have never seen in that. We were about to embark on the most, you know, aggressive bombing campaign and the history of U.S. warfare and all this stuff. And then he turned around and he criticized CNN for having a banner that said the U.S. War in the Middle East is intensifying. It's a fundamentally unsurious report. The sooner David Ellison takes over that network.

the better. It's like, you just outlined to them how it's intensifying, and now you're criticizing them for saying it's intensifying. They are like dissecting the media down to certain word choices, when in reality they should be worried about what the hell's happening actually on the ground. To the extent that the media have lost credibility, more than 50% of the blame falls on the right-wingers, which I include the entire Trump administration, lying about the media.

They're turning as much of the, all the people, who voted for Trump, they're just trying to discredit the media. And then the FCC chairman is going to turn around and like deny people licenses on the basis that you've lost credibility because we lied about you to the public. Yeah. So it's all, it's all part of a cycle. And honestly, Sam, even if you, you know, accept, which is true, that Donald Trump legitimately won the 2024 election, basically on that basis, because he won the election,

they are saying that anyone who disagrees with him as a liar, that, broadcast licenses can be withheld. So an entire regime of censorship, an entire authoritarian regime based on that one election. And that's not the way that a constitutional government is supposed to run. By the way, can I just throw in Trump bleated within the last day or half a day, a picture of how he had changed the media. He says Trump's, Trump is reshaping the media. There's one line that says gone, PBS defunded, NPR defunded, Terry Marin out at ABC, jury at out at MSNBC, Lesterhole. massive layoffs at the Washington Post.

Colbert out. Chuck Todd out, Jim Acosta out, John Dickerson out. Then he says reforms. And he talks about true social booming. FCC broadcast accountability. There's Brendan Carr. TikTok saved. CNN has new ownership.

ABC has a $15 million settlement. It goes on and on. And then there's a segment for winning, which is just weird headlines. He obviously didn't make this graphic, but he did repost it. That top section, he's reshaping the media. The entire section pretty much is people who have lost their jobs, who have been pushed out or resigned, in some cases, because his friends took over the media. I mean, and these are people that you and I know, John Dickerson, Chuck Todd, Terry Moran. These are people who, and the headline tweeted by, bleated by the president or re-bladed, says Donald Trump is reshaping the media.

That's it. The President of the United States is bragging about forcing certain journalists whose opinions, whose takes, who's reporting, who's honest reporting, he doesn't like out of professional journalism, out of their organizations. Meanwhile, the Secretary of Defense bragging about his oligarchs taking over various networks. The point is, all of this is the government of the United States openly saying we are controlling what you, the public, will get to hear and see. Well, the other point is you should subscribe to the bulwark because we don't put up with this bullshit.

Well, thank you for doing this. I appreciate it. I know it's a Saturday. A lot of stuff going on, but great to have you jump on and talk about this stuff. For those who are watching, thank you for watching us. We always appreciate that as well. I do mean when I say subscribe to the bulwark.

We're not going to bend. Not like that. Take care, buddy. Have a good rest of your weekend, okay? Thanks. Hey, Ontario. Come on down to BenMGMGM Casino and check out our newest exclusive.

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