‘Psychotic’: Trump under fire from diehard supporters
Donald Trump is under fire from some of his staunchest MAGA backers – including conservative commentator Tucker Carlson – over America’s involvement in Israel’s war on Iran.
The US President took aim at “kooky Tucker Carlson” in one of his trademark social media sprays on Tuesday (US time).
It came after the former Fox News host split ranks with Trump, warning in a conversation with former Trump strategist Steve Bannon, that US involvement in the Israel-Iran conflict would bring about the “end of American empire”.
It comes as Trump, who vowed to “make America great again” by ending “endless wars”, finds himself on the brink of a potential new one.
When Israel launched its missile offensive against Iran last Friday, Carlson blasted Trump as “complicit”. He warned Trump’s legacy was on the line depending on “what happens next”.
“The rise of Trump is from the Iraq war and the 2008 financial collapse,” Bannon told Carlson in return.
“We were lied to … and that’s what happening here, we’re not being told it straight.”
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Carlson and others among Trump’s most devout MAGA supporters also say the move flies in the face of his “America first” rhetoric.
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“Somebody please explain to kooky Tucker Carlson that, “IRAN CAN NOT HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON!” Trump fired back in a post on Truth Social.
“AMERICA FIRST means many GREAT things, including the fact that, IRAN CAN NOT HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON,” he followed up minutes later.
The US directed many nonessential military and diplomatic staffers to leave Iran last week, ahead of Israel’s attacks.
On Monday, Trump abruptly left the Group of Seven summit in Canada a day early, returning to Washington for urgent talks with his national security team.
Those moves sparked speculation among MAGA supporters that the US involvement in the Middle East might be about to ratchet up. There are suggestions the US might supply Israel with so-called “bunker-busting bombs” or offer other direct military support.
At home, conservative Georgia Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene, firebrand Charlie Kirk and even conspiracy theorist Alex Jones continue to remind their large audiences of Trump’s repeated election pledges that he would resist overseas military involvement if he retook the White House.
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“Tucker Carlson is one of my favourite people. He unapologetically believes the same things I do. That if we don’t fight for our own country and our own people then we will no longer have a country for our children and our grandchildren,” Taylor Green wrote on X, adding that “foreign wars/intervention/regime change put America last.”
“That’s not kooky,” she said.
“That’s what millions of Americans voted for. It’s what we believe is America First.”
Jones, meanwhile, wrote that “Trump attacking Tucker Carlson for not supporting a new WORLD WAR is not something any sane person should support! This is the stuff NIGHTMARES are MADE of”.
“I am proud that Tucker Carlson is standing his ground against the psychotic warmongering neocons that have brought the world to the verge of thermal nuclear Armageddon,” Jones, long one of the staunchest of Trump’s backers, said.
Kirk, another conservative firebrand, is also attacking Trump. He said Israel could do what it liked with Iran, but the US must not be involved.
“In the hours and days to come, there will be hawks who urge America to increase its involvement in this conflict. They will call for us to ‘finish off the mullahs’, or to help Israel with ‘mopping up’,” Kirk wrote on X.
“They will claim (tell me if you’ve heard this before) that if we topple the Iranian regime, we will be welcomed as ‘liberators’. We should be deeply skeptical of these arguments.”
Kirk said there should be no focus on regime change in Iran or “any further escalation of America’s involvement”.
“The last thing America needs right now is a new war. Our No.1 desire must be peace, as quickly as possible,” he wrote.
Bannon has warned that any increase in US activity in a war in the Middle East risks unravelling Trump’s own political base.
“It’s going to not just blow up the coalition,” Bannon said on Carlson’s show.
“It’s also going to thwart what we’re doing with the most important thing, which is the deportation” of illegal immigrants.
