President Trump claimed in his State of the Union address Tuesday night that Iran has developed missiles that can strike US military bases in Europe and the Middle East — and is working on weapons that can reach America itself.
“This is some terrible people,” Trump told lawmakers in reference to the Tehran regime, which rejected what it called “big lies” from the president. “They’ve already developed missiles that can threaten Europe and our bases overseas, and they’re working to build missiles that will soon reach the United States of America.”
The president added that despite US airstrikes on three key Iranian nuclear sites this past June, the Islamic Republic wants to start their atomic weapons program “all over … and are, at this moment, again pursuing their sinister ambitions.
“We are in negotiations with them,” Trump went on. “They want to make a deal but we haven’t heard those sacred words: ‘We will never have a nuclear weapon.’”
The next round of talks between Washington and Tehran are set for Thursday in Geneva, Switzerland. Trump special envoy Steve Witkoff, who will lead the US side, raised eyebrows Feb. 21 when he told Fox News that Iran was “probably a week away from having industrial-grade bomb-making material.”
Trump also quoted reports suggesting that the regime had killed 32,000 of its own citizens in a crackdown following anti-government protests that spread throughout Iran in December and January in response to the tenuous state of the country’s economy.
The jaw-dropping figure had been widely reported on social media, but not repeated by any prominent Western official or human rights group.
The Human Rights Activists News Agency, which relies on a network of informants inside Iran, estimated Monday that just under 6,500 protesters had been killed in the crackdown, with a further 11,744 cases “under review.”
“Just over the last couple of months with the protests, they’ve killed at least, it looks like 32,000 protesters, 32,000 protesters in their own country,” the president said Tuesday night. “They shot them and hung them. We stopped them from hanging a lot of them with the threat of serious violence.”
Esmail Baghaei, a spokesman for Iran’s foreign ministry, dismissed Trump’s remarks as part of a “disinformation and misinformation campaign” Wednesday, saying: “Whatever [the US is] alleging in regards to Iran’s nuclear program, Iran’s ballistic missiles, and the number of casualties during January’s unrest is simply the repetition of big lies.”
Hours before Trump took the rostrum in the House chamber, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and CIA Director John Ratcliffe briefed congressional leaders at the White House on potential military action against Iran.
“This is serious, and the administration has to make its case to the American people,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) told reporters following the briefing, without elaborating on its contents.
“I’m very concerned,” added House Intelligence Committee vice chairman Jim Himes (D-Conn.). “Wars in the Middle East don’t go well for presidents, for the country, and we have not heard articulated a single good reason for why now is the moment to launch yet another war in the Middle East.”
Trump threatened on Jan. 2 to bomb Iran if authorities killed anti-regime protesters. He later paused an anticipated strike when Tehran claimed to scrap 800 planned executions, and subsequent talks have focused on Iran’s nuclear program.
At the same time, the president has ordered two US aircraft carrier groups into position for possible strikes.
Trump has publicly endorsed regime change in Iran, but it’s unclear if potential US strikes would seek to accomplish that — either by assassinating the country’s leaders or softening up the government for potential overthrow.
Earlier this week, the White House was forced to deny reports that Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, had warned Trump about the risks of being drawn into a sustained Middle Eastern conflict.
