Up First from NPR - Trump And Iran, Iran's Nuclear Program, ICE Farm Raids Continue

Episode Date: June 18, 2025

President Trump has escalated his rhetoric against Iran. Israel and the U.S. intelligence community disagree about whether Iran has suspended its nuclear weapons program or not, and immigration enforcement continues to target work sites in agriculture, construction and hospitality. Want more comprehensive analysis of the most important news of the day, plus a little fun? Subscribe to the Up First newsletter.Today's episode of Up First was edited by Dana Farrington, Andrew Sussman, Anna Yukhananov, Janaya Williams and Alice Woelfle. It was produced by Ziad Buchh, Claire Murashima and Christopher Thomas. We get engineering support from Stacey Abbott. And our technical director is Carleigh Strange. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

President Trump campaigned to get the United States out of foreign wars. He's now considering whether to join Israel's campaign against Iran, what are the risks abroad, and the political costs at home. I'm Steve Inskeep with A Martinez and this is Up First from NPR News. Israel asserts that Iran is making a big new push to make a nuclear bomb and that they're on the verge of success. The U.S. intelligence community has said otherwise. They assert that Iran suspended its weapons program more than 20 years ago, so who's right?

And the White House is sending mixed messages about how it'll enforce immigration orders for agricultural workers. President Trump promised to find solutions for farmers, but ICE officers are still targeting workplaces such as meatpacking plants and dairy farms. Stay with us. We've got all the news you need to start your day. These days there is a lot of news. It can be hard to keep up with what it means for you, your family, and your community. Consider This from NPR is a podcast that helps you make sense of the news. Six days a week, we bring you a deep dive on a story and provide the context, the backstory,

and analysis you need to understand our rapidly changing world. Listen to the Consider This podcast from NPR. Hola, it's Sarah Gonzalez. At Planet Money, when we say we want you to understand the economy, sure, we mean tariffs and global supply chains and interest rates, cosas así, but also we shot a satellite into space. We made our own vodka, became a record label, made a comic book, all to help you make better sense of the world around you.

Listen to the Planet Money Podcast from NPR. On NPR's Thru Line. School teachers are going to be the ones that rebuild our society in a way that is more cohesive. Basically, where soldiers set down their arms, school teachers need to pick up their books. How the U.S. Department of Education tried to fix a divided nation. Listen to Thru Line, wherever you get your podcasts. President Trump once distanced himself from Israel's military action.

Now he's taken some ownership. The president is talking in terms of we, when he discusses Israel's war against Iran. He's even saying the United States could take out his words, the supreme leader of Iran calling Ayatollah the Khamenei an easy target who is only safe for now. The president has faced some pushback from his own political allies who oppose American involvement.

MPR White House correspondent Franco Ordonez has been covering this. So Franco, President Trump spent the afternoon yesterday with his national security team in the Situation Room. What are the chances of deeper United States involvement here? Yeah, A, that's the big question and that was being debated in the situation room. You know, the future of US action in this conflict.

I mean, Trump has repeatedly said all options are on the table. He's drawn a red line if soldiers are targeted, but he's also signaling the US is already more involved than the White House previously led on. Just as Steve was pointing out, he's boasting that quote, we now have total complete control the skies over Iran. He's saying we know where the Supreme Leader is. I mean, he's repeatedly using that word, we, blurring the line between Israel's objective

and US objectives. You know, and taking that kind of ownership has really raised more concerns of the US getting more involved into another foreign conflict. Yeah, so that's interesting because some of the people who are most concerned about foreign involvement are allies of President Trump. So tell us more about this friction. Yeah, for someone who has such dedicated supporters, it's really notable that some of Trump's longtime backers are questioning his judgment here. Trump, of course, has long been

known for his America First message. And some key conservative allies, such as former Fox News host Tucker Carlson and Trump's former White House aide Steve Bannon, see Trump straying from America First and are pressing him to stay out of this fight. Here's Carlson explaining his position on Bannon's podcast War Room. My interest is really simple. I don't want the United States enmeshed in another Middle Eastern war that doesn't serve our interests. Now, Trump campaigned on ending long wars, peace through strength, he would say.

I also spoke with Brett Bruin, who served as the White House Director of Global Engagement in the Obama administration. He said Trump supporters thought they were getting a president who was going to disentangle the US from overseas commitments. What they're seeing, however, is a president who is getting pulled back in to a foreign crisis that another country started and that the US interests remain somewhat questionable. Okay, so how is President Trump responding to these criticisms? Well, he's pushing back, especially against Carlson.

Trump posted on social media, quote, somebody please explain to Kookie Tucker Carlson that Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. Vice President JD Vance has also weighed in on social media saying Trump has shown restraint, but that Trump has right to decide whether to take further action to end Iranian enrichment. No, you know, I, you mentioned enrichment. I, I remember like a few weeks ago,

Trump had actually been talking about a deal right before with the most recent strikes. So does this latest stance mean that that diplomacy is now completely over? Yeah, I mean, right now, Trump doesn't appear to be interested in diplomacy. He told reporters he's not in the mood to negotiate. What we don't know is whether at the same time this tough talk is part of his strategy to further pressure Iran because he's also said he may send Vance and special envoy Steve Witkoff to negotiate, though perhaps not right now. All right, that's the White House correspondent, Franco Ordonez. Thanks a lot. Thanks, A.

All right, now we're going to take a closer look at Iran's nuclear program. Which matters a lot here because Israeli Prime. All right, now we're going to take a closer look at Iran's nuclear program. Which matters a lot here because Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he ordered the attack on Iran because he believed Iran was marching very quickly toward a nuclear weapon. The U.S. intelligence community has been saying something else. It says Iran suspended its nuclear weapons program more than two decades ago and has never reversed that assessment.

So who's right? To sort this out, we've called on NPR national security correspondent Greg Myrie. So Greg, there are clips, video clips of Benjamin Netanyahu saying that Iran is close to producing nuclear bombs. Those clips go back 30 years to 1995. Can you lay out the conflicting arguments here? Yeah, so Netanyahu has been saying time and again that Iran is on the verge of a bomb, and he's saying he ordered the attack now because Israel believes Iran

was making a big new push to get there rapidly. He didn't provide details, but he claimed the intelligence was clear and was shared with the U.S. Now the U.S. intelligence community has had a very different position. It says Iran suspended its weapons program back in 2003. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard stated this in congressional testimony in March, said Iran was still enriching uranium, but nothing really new. This was very familiar ground. Now, Trump has contradicted Gabbard saying, quote, I don't care what she said. I think they,

meaning the Iranians, were very close to having it. But here's the other thing too, because international inspectors have been monitoring Iran's program for a long time, for years, so what do they have to say? Yeah, the UN's nuclear watchdog agency, the International Atomic Energy Agency, says Iran has enriched quite a bit of uranium to 60% purity. You need to get to 90% purity before it's considered weapons grade, but that change, that upgrade can be done very quickly. If Iran did this, it would have enough uranium to make around 10 nuclear weapons. Iran would still need to take several

additional steps to make an actual bomb. Most experts think we're talking about a matter of months though. And now, of course, everything is changing by the day. Israel has already hit a number of nuclear sites and it's hard to make a full assessment at this point. Then if the U.S. decides to actually attack Iran, what action would it take? Israel wants the U.S. to do one big thing thing and that's use its massive bunker busting bombs to hit the Fordo nuclear facility which has this enriched uranium. Now this is a major challenge because Fordo is built into a mountainside

which is a little over a hundred miles south of Tehran. If the US strikes the thinking is it would use this bomb that weighs 30,000 pounds, 15 tons. It's formally known as the GBU-57 or the Massive Ordnance Penetrator. It's so massive that only one US plane can carry it, the B-2 bomber. And Israel relies almost entirely on US planes and US bombs, but it doesn't have this bomb or this plane. And Israel has repeatedly requested this weapon from the US, but the US has always declined. So do we know if this bomb would in fact destroy a

nuclear facility protected by a mountain? Yeah, that's an open question. We just don't know for sure, and there's lots of variables. The nuclear facility is believed to be about 300 feet under the mountain and this is a mountain that consists of very hard rock, meaning it could be difficult to penetrate. Israel says it's taking control over the skies of Tehran, so U.S. planes could likely approach this nuclear facility facing little or no threat, but it's just not clear whether the site could be completely destroyed. It could take multiple bombing runs and there are no guarantees this would be the outcome.

All right. That's NPR's Greg Myreek. Thanks, Greg. Sure thing. Some other news now, a kind of clarification. The Department of Homeland Security says it is still targeting industries that employ lots of people without legal status. Employers in agriculture, construction, hospitality have worried about losing their workforces

to immigration raids, and several raids last week heightened their concern. And even President Trump said he worried about losing, quote, very good, long-time workers. Now DHS has clarified what they intend to do. NPR immigration policy reporter, Jimena Bastillo is in our studios. Good to see you. Good morning. Is the administration acting on the president's concern

by calling off some enforcement? You know, there really has been a lot of inconsistent messaging, and that really stems from there's two schools of thoughts, primarily within the Republican Party, on how to handle workers without legal status. The first faction is really understanding that their communities and industries are heavily reliant on workers without legal status and that if those workers were just to go

away, entire local economies and supply chains would fall apart. These are in areas that are very red, Republican and industries that generally back the president. But then there's this other group and it's the part of the base that wants to increase deportations no matter what, no matter who. And these are the folks that hold very high level positions within the administration thinking like White House borders are Tom Homan, Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem. They're pushing immigration officials to arrest up to 3,000 people a day

in order to achieve the president's goal of mass deportations. Okay, so that's the conflict. What has actually been happening on the ground? So until recently, the agriculture sector had generally been left alone, but then last week we saw several instances of immigration officers arresting and targeting the ag sector. Particularly 70 people were arrested at a meatpacking plant in Nebraska.

Several farms got targeted in California and a dairy farm in New Mexico as well. And that really sent employers and workers into high alert. The next day, President Trump once again promised to find a solution for farmers specifically, posting on Truth Social that these workers needed to be protected. But then again, this week, we're seeing the Department of Homeland Security double down again, kind of a bit of a whiplash for this industry. Assistant Secretary of Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin has said that there's no safe spaces for industries who, quote, harbor violent criminals and that worksite enforcement remains

a cornerstone of their efforts. Meaning that these raids can go ahead, anybody can be targeted at any time. Correct. So how are employers and employees preparing for that? So advocates representing employers have told me that they continue to be concerned. They underscore that they want to follow the law and many times they believe that they continue to be concerned. You know, they underscore that they want to follow the law and many times they believe that they are, but they say that even if they think all their employees have work authorization, they know that doesn't mean their families or their

friends or people in their communities have legal status. And that is what leads us into what the administration is calling collateral arrests, which means if one person is targeted, anyone that happens to be around them at the time that they're arrested also gets arrested if they have, you know, lack legal status or something needs to be questioned. You know, we still don't know what the White House's solutions are for the farming industry despite months of promises that there will be something, but that also means there will be continued pressure on, you know, coming from some of these key industries

in the United States that could be a hurdle for what the president wants to do. NPR's Samantha Bastillo, thanks for the update. Thank you. And that's up first for Wednesday, June 18th, on May Martinez. And I'm Steve Inskeep. Your next listen is Consider This from NPR News.

Up first, gives you three big stories of the day. Consider This drills down on one. Listen now on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts. Today's episode of Up First was edited by Dana Farrington, Andrew Sussman, Anna Yukhaninoff, Alice Wolfley, and Janaya Williams. It was produced by Zia Butch, Claire Morishima, and Christopher Thomas. We get engineering support from Stacey Abbott. Our technical director is Carly Strange. Join us again tomorrow.

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