Verdict with Ted Cruz - Iran Strike Ayatollah DEAD, Austin Shooting-Why, How & What's Next

00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:00:02.700 Guaranteed human.

00:00:06.300 Welcome.

00:00:06.920 It is Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you.

00:00:09.780 And obviously, this is a very big show.

00:00:12.000 Many of you may have not ever listened to the show before.

00:00:14.140 We want to welcome you as we're obviously going to be talking a lot about the attack on Iran 0.99

00:00:17.940 and what is happening.

00:00:19.600 So if you're joining us for the very first time, it's nice to have you.

00:00:22.280 Don't forget, hit that subscribe or auto download button wherever you get your podcasts.

00:00:27.400 Senator, this is obviously a very big show and it's an important one because the world

00:00:32.000 is changing before our very eyes.

00:00:34.600 On Saturday, President Trump launched a major military attack on Iran, a bombing from the

00:00:42.760 sky, bombing from naval vessels.

00:00:45.120 It was done in close coordination with Israel that likewise launched a bombing attack.

00:00:50.680 In the opening minutes and hours of the attack, the Ayatollah Khamenei was killed.

00:00:56.840 Other major leaders of Iran were killed.

00:00:59.340 The bombing is ongoing.

00:01:01.240 You and I are recording this Sunday afternoon.

00:01:04.220 As of right now, over 900 bombing strikes have been carried out by the United States.

00:01:09.860 Over 1,200 bombing strikes have been carried out by Israel.

00:01:14.660 I spent the entire day on Friday with President Trump.

00:01:18.720 The day before the attack, we spent much of the time discussing the attack that was coming.

00:01:25.240 This podcast, we're going to try to explain exactly what's happening, why President Trump

00:01:30.980 attacked Iran, what is likely to happen as a result, and what the next stages are.

00:01:37.320 We're also going to talk about the mass shooting that occurred at 2 a.m. Sunday morning in Austin,

00:01:43.520 Texas, in a bar on 6th Street, where a gunman murdered two other people and injured 17.

00:01:50.980 That gunman, in turn, was shot and killed by Austin police.

00:01:55.520 Early indicia makes it appear that this was a terrorist attack.

00:01:59.260 He was wearing a sweatshirt that said, property of Allah.

00:02:02.200 He was wearing a shirt with the Iranian flag on it.

00:02:05.040 It is still early.

00:02:06.000 I spoke today with Kash Patel, the director of the FBI.

00:02:09.800 We're going to break that down as well.

00:02:11.680 This is going to be a podcast where we try to examine everything you need to know about

00:02:16.340 what is happening in Iran, how it is going to impact the United States, and what's coming next.

00:02:22.400 Yeah, it's really important.

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00:04:06.400 So, Senator, you mentioned earlier that you were on the plane with President Trump, Air Force One.

00:04:10.460 We're going to get to that and what was discussed on the plane in a moment,

00:04:13.120 because a lot of people listening, they're going to want to hear that.

00:04:15.400 But let's talk about the biggest news now, and you actually were on Face the Nation earlier today

00:04:20.660 and had a lot to say about this attack on Iran and how successful it's been so far.

00:04:26.560 So, take a listen to what Senator Cruz had to say earlier today on Face the Nation.

00:04:30.660 Senator, just looking at the global environment right now,

00:04:35.140 CENTCOM announced three Americans were killed and five seriously wounded in this operation.

00:04:39.800 President Trump and Vice President Vance campaigned on not getting America involved in new wars.

00:04:47.300 What do you say to Americans this morning who are asking why we are in this conflict now?

00:04:54.120 President Trump's decision to launch this decisive action against Iran

00:04:58.560 is the single most important decision of his presidency.

00:05:01.660 I think he laid out powerfully and effectively why he is taking this action.

00:05:07.080 He is taking this action because the government of Iran is a profound and malign influence. 1.00

00:05:13.960 They have been the leading state sponsor of terrorism for 47 years.

00:05:20.260 They have over that time killed nearly 1,000 Americans.

00:05:24.860 They provide more than 90% of the funding for Hamas.

00:05:31.440 They provide more than 90% of the funding for Hezbollah.

00:05:35.940 The Iranian Ayatollah was, until yesterday,

00:05:39.360 actively trying to murder the President of the United States, Donald J. Trump.

00:05:44.100 I spent the entire day with President Trump on Friday, right before he launched these attacks.

00:05:49.760 He and I discussed this at length on Friday.

00:05:52.420 My counsel to him was that the Iranian regime has never been weaker,

00:05:57.780 that it was teetering, and now was the time.

00:06:01.140 My advice was, do not miss this opportunity.

00:06:06.060 I think the President has acted boldly.

00:06:08.500 He's acted decisively.

00:06:10.620 And Iran no longer being led by a theocratic, murderous dictator,

00:06:18.740 that makes America much, much safer.

00:06:21.920 Senator, you are not going to find a lot of people in any way defending the Supreme Leader.

00:06:26.820 That is for sure.

00:06:28.480 However, putting Americans in harm's way is what I'm pressing you on here.

00:06:33.760 Did the President explain to you why he called off active diplomacy?

00:06:41.040 Because at the very same time he was on that plane,

00:06:43.900 the Vice President of the United States was talking to the Omani mediator

00:06:46.700 who was trying to get a deal and told us that they were close to one.

00:06:49.660 Why not choose diplomacy?

00:06:51.580 Because the diplomacy was an abject failure.

00:06:56.480 The Iranians approached the diplomacy with arrogance, which with absolute hubris. 1.00

00:07:02.760 They said they would not stop enriching.

00:07:05.860 No matter what, they were going to continue to enrich uranium.

00:07:08.680 They would not discuss zero enrichment.

00:07:11.840 They claimed a right to enrich uranium in underground bunkers with no supervision.

00:07:18.560 As President Trump said on Friday when he was with me in Texas,

00:07:21.980 his line was zero enrichment.

00:07:25.000 And the Iranians refused to discuss it.

00:07:28.640 They also refused to discuss their proxies.

00:07:31.100 They refused to discuss Hamas and Hezbollah and the Houthis.

00:07:34.420 And President Trump understood that the Iranian, quote, negotiation was just a stall tactic.

00:07:41.560 And that the only response, my advice to him, I said there's only one deal you should accept.

00:07:48.160 And it's the deal that you offered Maduro,

00:07:50.660 which is if you want to leave and flee the country, you can do so.

00:07:54.540 Anything else is unacceptable.

00:07:57.920 And Khamenei made his choice.

00:07:59.960 Well, there are disputes there in terms of your characterization of what was actually on the table

00:08:06.520 and what the administration had indicated it was willing to accept

00:08:10.180 in terms of allowing enrichment for medical purposes and the like.

00:08:13.700 But that's now obviously done.

00:08:15.360 So, Margaret, what I just told you is almost word for word

00:08:20.200 what Secretary of State Marco Rubio told me yesterday.

00:08:24.540 Can you tell us now if you believe that there was an ongoing nuclear weapons program?

00:08:31.760 One of the top arms control arms control experts out there, David Albright, has written

00:08:36.760 there should be an immediate priority on rapid response operations to secure Iran's nuclear stockpiles right now.

00:08:44.340 Can you assure the public that it will be secured?

00:08:47.000 And if so, who is doing it if there are no Israeli or U.S. forces on the ground?

00:08:53.700 So there is no doubt that a year ago, Iran had an active and ongoing nuclear weapons program. 0.53

00:08:59.380 We took out the vast majority of that at the end of the 12-day war.

00:09:04.140 That U.S. intelligence assessment was not made public, if that is what was briefed to you.

00:09:07.880 We took out, we launched targeted bombs at the end of the 12-day war where we dropped the equivalent of about a third of a nuclear weapon

00:09:18.840 on those underground facilities, facilities like Fordow, which is built into the base of a mountain.

00:09:24.980 The bunker buster bombs we used, Israel doesn't have those bombs.

00:09:28.580 No other country has those bombs.

00:09:31.640 We took them out last year.

00:09:34.480 The Iranians were still hell-bent on rebuilding them. 1.00

00:09:38.220 And one of the things we are doing right now is taking out their missiles, in particular the southern missile belt.

00:09:44.820 Right now, Iran is building roughly 100 missiles a month.

00:09:48.780 They are actively building missiles to threaten their neighbors.

00:09:52.620 They're firing some of them right now at their neighbors, at our allies.

00:09:55.960 They're illustrating powerfully.

00:09:57.860 They're attacking virtually every Arab neighbor that surrounds them. 1.00

00:10:02.280 They are firing missiles that it's almost like they want to illustrate to the world just how malign they are.

00:10:08.660 But in terms of containing the risk, who's securing the nuclear material that you say still exists within Iran?

00:10:14.940 Who's doing that?

00:10:16.520 Look, the quantity of nuclear material, I didn't say anything one way or another on that.

00:10:22.040 What I said is they were building nuclear weapons a year ago, and our bombing took that out.

00:10:28.000 They also had an ongoing desire to rebuild them.

00:10:31.680 I don't have present-day intelligence on what progress they had made towards rebuilding nuclear weapons since we bombed their facilities.

00:10:40.880 I have no indication that they were anywhere close to getting nuclear weapons because our bombing was devastating.

00:10:49.220 And, Margaret, that's one of the reasons I urged President Trump, now is the time.

00:10:54.300 You know, dictatorships survive because they're perceived as invulnerable.

00:10:58.700 And in this instance, Iran decisively lost the 12-day war that weakened the regime and set up what the president is doing now.

00:11:08.180 Senator, I found it very interesting just how much she wanted to say that somehow her sources are better than your sources

00:11:15.120 when you were just with the president of the United States of America and just talked directly to Marco Rubio.

00:11:19.840 It was pretty hilarious.

00:11:21.180 She's like, well, that's not what all the intelligence says.

00:11:23.260 And you're like, no, like I just talked to the people where the intelligence is coming from.

00:11:27.320 Now, this is why I go back and say you don't hate the media enough.

00:11:31.000 This is what they do.

00:11:32.120 By the way, we saw this with headlines today.

00:11:34.000 New York Times, a great example of the propaganda of how they're like still standing there acting like the Ayatollah 0.99

00:11:40.200 was some sort of like decent and humane individual that was taken out.

00:11:44.700 This is the narrative, and you witnessed it right there in that interview with you.

00:11:48.380 Well, the New York Times headline says,

00:11:50.900 Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, hardline cleric who made Iran a regional power, is dead at 86. 0.79

00:12:01.600 Which is just ridiculous.

00:12:05.100 And I'll say, Mark Halperin had an amusing take on it. 0.74

00:12:10.440 He said that headline was a little bit like a headline, quote,

00:12:14.540 Jeffrey Dahmer, hungry Wisconsin man, passes away.

00:12:18.160 Yeah, it's not far off.

00:12:21.520 While technically accurate, it conveys, you know, approval of the conduct. 0.52

00:12:31.880 And in fact, I want to, in fact, that New York Times headline is as ridiculous as the older Washington Post headline

00:12:40.940 that read, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, austere religious scholar at the helm of Islamic State, dies at 48.

00:12:51.200 I mean, it's just absurd, but it's actually, it's not the worst.

00:12:58.200 The Washington Post wrote an obituary for the Ayatollah that if Saturday Night Live had done this,

00:13:07.360 they couldn't have made it more absurd.

00:13:08.560 I'm going to read you a paragraph from it.

00:13:12.020 With his bushy white beard and easy smile, Ayatollah Khamenei cut a more avuncular figure in public

00:13:20.380 than his perpetually scowling but much more revered mentor.

00:13:25.440 And he was known to be fond of Persian poetry and classic Western novels, especially Victor Hugo's Les Miserables.

00:13:33.540 Some Iranians knew Ayatollah Khamenei before he became supreme leader, described him as a, quote, closet moderate. 0.54

00:13:45.000 Look, that is sick. 0.96

00:13:47.600 This is the same Ayatollah who regularly chants death to America and death to Israel. 0.80

00:13:54.280 This is the same Ayatollah that set the goal of creating nuclear weapons, I believe, for the purpose of using those nuclear weapons. 0.98

00:14:03.080 This is the same Ayatollah who is responsible for killing nearly 1,000 Americans, for waging war on America relentlessly, 0.99

00:14:12.660 for funding Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis.

00:14:16.500 90% of their funding comes from Iran.

00:14:19.840 This is the same Ayatollah. 0.93

00:14:21.400 Look, one of the reasons we went into Venezuela is Iran had a major beachhead in Venezuela.

00:14:27.140 Maduro allowed Iran in there.

00:14:29.660 Hezbollah had a major beachhead to wage war in Venezuela to attack the United States.

00:14:38.500 Look, this avuncular man with a bushy white beard, as the numbskulls at the Washington Post put it, 0.77

00:14:48.400 until yesterday, was actively trying to murder President Donald Trump. 0.93

00:14:54.400 Had hired hitmen, had put out a video, an animation showing a drone going to Mar-a-Lago and killing President Trump on the golf course. 1.00

00:15:05.160 You know, the phrase for the media that's been used more than once is useful idiots. 0.99

00:15:10.600 And I think sometimes headline writers decide they haven't given us enough material. 1.00

00:15:16.240 They need to be even more ridiculous, cheering for our enemies.

00:15:19.220 As Operation Epic Fury intensifies, the world braces for what comes next, 0.95

00:15:25.580 and people of faith pray for freedom and for God's people to be protected.

00:15:30.700 In the Holy Land, red alert sirens fill the air.

00:15:34.860 Sirens that give you 15 seconds to reach the nearest bomb shelter.

00:15:39.320 The situation is serious, and the threat is real.

00:15:42.840 In times like this, freedom and faith aren't just abstract ideas.

00:15:47.780 They are what we depend on.

00:15:50.820 And the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews is on the ground,

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00:16:39.980 All right, I got a lot of questions, Senator, and everybody listening right now,

00:16:44.320 I know is going to want to ask the same one.

00:16:45.780 I'm going to ask, you're on Air Force One, you were in D.C., you flew with the president back to Texas.

00:16:52.900 How much of the conversation on Air Force One was about this becoming a reality 24 hours later,

00:16:59.240 less than 24 hours later?

00:17:00.420 You guys either had great poker faces when you were down there in front of that ship that we had seized in Venezuela in the oil

00:17:06.460 and what you were doing on that trip because clearly this was in the final moments of the planning stages

00:17:13.180 or execution, I should say, stages of this plan.

00:17:16.440 What all was discussed on there that you can talk to us about?

00:17:19.480 Yeah, so I was on Air Force One with President Trump flying from Washington, D.C. down to Texas to Corpus Christi.

00:17:25.400 I was joined by my colleague, Senator John Cornyn, and then there were multiple members of Congress that were there.

00:17:31.960 And the president came and was talking with us and asking about Iran.

00:17:36.580 And he went around the room and he said, should we strike?

00:17:39.100 What do you think?

00:17:39.720 Should we strike? 1.00

00:17:40.400 Should we hit them hard? 0.99

00:17:42.120 Or should we go and keep trying to cut a deal? 0.98

00:17:45.560 What do you think? 0.99

00:17:46.780 I will tell you, every one of us that was on the plane, it was unanimous, we said hit them and hit them hard. 0.99

00:17:51.840 That was the assessment. 0.98

00:17:53.040 And look, Trump often, when he's making decisions and talking to people who he trusts, he tries to get their take.

00:18:00.800 Their thoughts, yeah.

00:18:01.620 Yeah, he wants a barometer.

00:18:03.140 Is this a good idea?

00:18:04.180 What are the risks?

00:18:04.880 What should we do?

00:18:06.260 So we talked quite a bit on Air Force One about it.

00:18:08.760 And then when we landed, the president waved me over to join him in the Beast.

00:18:15.260 And so he and I drove from the tarmac to the event.

00:18:19.340 It was probably 15, 20 minutes.

00:18:20.640 And it was just the two of us in the Beast.

00:18:22.000 We were the only two.

00:18:23.560 And we spent almost the entire time talking about Iran further.

00:18:28.340 And so that was one-on-one.

00:18:30.620 And in that context, I was leaning in even more vigorously than I had on Air Force One and was saying, listen, this is a moment in time which we've never had like this before.

00:18:42.600 Yeah.

00:18:42.680 This regime is so weak.

00:18:46.080 You know, dictatorships, and this is true, this is true of the Soviet Union, this is true of Communist China, this is true of Hugo Chavez and Nicolas Maduro, this is true of the Communist regime in Cuba, and this is true of Iran.

00:18:59.620 And dictatorships, and dictatorships depend upon convincing their citizens they're invulnerable, that nothing can defeat them.

00:19:06.820 And that's part of how you keep 92 million Iranians subjugated is the feeling that it's hopeless. 0.56

00:19:13.240 We cannot overthrow these tyrants.

00:19:16.060 And understand, the Ayatollah was a tyrant. 0.74

00:19:19.240 He regularly murdered his own citizens, tortured his own citizens, stripped them of their freedom.

00:19:24.280 I mean, the abuses were horrific directed to his own citizens, much less the murder and terror that he projected outward.

00:19:31.460 And last year, when the 12-day war happened, you know, it's interesting, some folks in politics behave like everything is communications, everything is comms and messaging and spin.

00:19:44.640 There are very real-world effects when you lose a war. 0.99

00:19:50.020 There was a war for 12 days, and Iran utterly and completely got its ass kicked. 0.99

00:19:56.060 And if there's anything worse, if you're an Islamist dictator, if you're trying to envision a world that is worse than losing a war, it's losing a war to Israel. 0.99

00:20:08.300 It was Israel that completely and totally decimated them, that took out their air defenses, took out the leadership of the IRGC. 0.68

00:20:15.900 And by the way, day after day, the Ayatollah would appoint a new leader of the IRGC, the next day that guy was dead.

00:20:21.920 He'd appoint a new one, the next day that guy was dead.

00:20:24.060 It demonstrated complete and total penetration by the Mossad and by American intelligence of Iran, knowing where everybody was.

00:20:36.540 And that, and obviously it culminated with President Trump launching the bombing run, taking out the underground nuclear facilities.

00:20:44.280 That, when that happened, you and I on this podcast said in the wake of that, we predicted this regime is going to fall.

00:20:51.000 And I said, they are so weak now, the Iranian people rose up, rose up in massive numbers, over a million Iranians in protest.

00:21:00.660 And by the way, the response of the Ayatollah was to order his soldiers just to fire machine guns at them, killing anywhere between 10,000 and 40,000 protesters.

00:21:10.740 We don't have, I haven't seen really firm estimates.

00:21:13.180 I think it is at least 10,000.

00:21:14.900 It could be as high as 40,000. 0.99

00:21:17.060 But that shows the level of tyranny when you say just unload and fire into the crowd and kill as many as you can. 0.98

00:21:24.100 That's what they were doing.

00:21:25.000 President Trump's actions this weekend levels the playing field and has taken out.

00:21:33.180 By the way, it's also an illustration of exquisite intelligence.

00:21:38.640 The early bombing strike that occurred that killed Ayatollah Khamenei, the reporting we're getting, and this is open source.

00:21:49.740 I don't have any classified information on this, but the public reporting is that there was a meeting of the Ayatollah along with basically his National Security Council, his top military advisors.

00:22:02.260 And that's the meeting that Israel struck and took him out.

00:22:05.800 And so they knew exactly where he was.

00:22:08.500 They knew where his senior leaders were.

00:22:11.560 That is, and so when I was riding in the beast with the president, I was urging him, this is the moment.

00:22:17.540 And he's like, well, what do you think of the negotiations?

00:22:20.040 And I said, Mr. President, they're just dragging it out.

00:22:23.500 It's just a delay tactic.

00:22:25.220 They think they can delay and that you'll let the moment pass.

00:22:29.660 And listen, is there risk?

00:22:32.320 Of course there's risk.

00:22:33.380 There's even more risk if you don't act, right?

00:22:36.660 I mean, that's how you look at this.

00:22:37.920 When people say, I don't like war, you know, I can't believe you're advocating for this.

00:22:41.500 I don't like war either.

00:22:42.720 But I really don't like a war where Iran starts it and Iran has a nuclear weapon and Iran kills countless innocent people, 0.63

00:22:48.940 whether it is a dirty bomb or Israel or wherever they decide to do it in the world or have one of their proxies. 0.57

00:22:53.460 That was the biggest thing that I don't think people understood about Iran.

00:22:57.200 Iran getting a nuclear weapon center is not just them having it. 0.52

00:23:00.000 It's that they have these proxies they could also give them to and dirty bombs could go.

00:23:04.860 That's a major concern that a lot of people don't think understood in the complexity of Iran.

00:23:10.160 They're not the one that always has to shoot.

00:23:12.200 They may give the supplies needed to someone else to do it for them.

00:23:15.240 Well, that's right. And that's one of the real risks of escalation in the coming days is those proxies, Hamas and Hezbollah and the Houthis,

00:23:24.080 engaging in acts of violence, engaging in acts of terrorism and targeting Americans.

00:23:28.420 We have three American servicemen who have already been killed.

00:23:31.300 And listen, military conflict, tragically, casualties can be part of military conflict.

00:23:37.280 We also have the shooting that occurred in Austin, Texas, and it is still early.

00:23:44.740 Our reports are preliminary.

00:23:47.320 But but from the preliminary reports, it certainly appears that this was terrorism and terrorism directly related to what occurred.

00:23:56.820 So here here's what we know right now. The shooting took place at 159 a.m. on March 1st at Buford's Backyard Beer Garden,

00:24:07.080 which is on West 6th Street in downtown Austin.

00:24:10.440 And you and I have both been in in in an Austin bar at two in the morning on a Saturday night many, many times.

00:24:17.860 The the the Austin 6th Street scene is is a lively scene.

00:24:22.560 Yeah. Yeah. Here's what we know so far.

00:24:25.860 Three individuals are dead, one of whom is the shooter.

00:24:29.800 Fourteen people were injured and transported to local hospitals.

00:24:34.720 Three of the injured as of right now remain in critical condition.

00:24:39.500 Two weapons were were recovered from from the scene, a pistol and a rifle.

00:24:44.940 And and evidence from it from the SUV, SUV and nearby cameras is still being processed.

00:24:51.340 Law enforcement and FBI agents at the scene has gone to this to the residents and two different residences of the individual that was the shooter.

00:25:04.100 Now, what's been publicly reported is the shooter is a man named in Diaga Diagne, who is a 53 year old naturalized U.S. citizen born in Senegal and residing in Pflugerville, which is a town just north of Austin.

00:25:23.800 Uh, he he came to the United States during the Obama presidency.

00:25:28.720 Reports indicated.

00:25:31.360 That the shooter was armed and he was wearing a sweater that with the phrase property of Allah across the front of the sweater.

00:25:40.720 He was also reportedly wearing an undershirt with an Iranian flag on it underneath that shirt and a Koran was found in the car.

00:25:50.360 Now, I spoke this afternoon with with the mayor of Austin.

00:25:55.200 I spoke this afternoon with Kash Patel, the director of the FBI.

00:25:59.260 As of Sunday afternoon, they do not have clear evidence of motive from.

00:26:06.620 So they're right now carrying out the search warrants on his residence.

00:26:09.840 They're examining his social media.

00:26:11.520 They're examining phone calls that they're putting the evidence, putting together the evidence to determine what went on.

00:26:19.780 If he acted alone, what the precise motivation was.

00:26:23.040 That being said, given the sweatshirt and shirt he was wearing and given given his origin from Senegal, I think it is very likely this is terrorism. 0.78

00:26:33.100 That that it is not a coincidence, I believe, that he's wearing an Iranian flag while he is opening fire.

00:26:41.500 That evidence is not conclusively been proven yet, but I expect that it will be.

00:26:46.100 Interestingly, he did not enter the bar.

00:26:48.540 He opened fire from outside, from from the street and sidewalk, open fire and shot into the bar and three Austin police officers took him out, killed him, shot him on the street.

00:27:01.940 The mayor told me that the Austin police was there within a minute.

00:27:06.440 So it was a very fast, very fast response and took him out.

00:27:10.980 Thank goodness.

00:27:11.700 Saved a lot of lives.

00:27:12.500 You know, and I'm told the video, there's videos that will be released, show chaos, show people running.

00:27:19.220 And in fact, some of the people are running actually towards the shooter because they heard gunshots, but did not know where they were coming from.

00:27:27.680 And so they were running, but but accidentally running the wrong way.

00:27:30.720 I think it is very clear if if law enforcement had not acted quickly, many more people would have been killed and injured.

00:27:39.720 But this look from his clothing.

00:27:43.920 It certainly appears this is terrorism.

00:27:46.020 And tragically, this may not be the last incident of terrorism that occurs.

00:27:51.500 That's one of the real dangers of escalation, either from Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis or from sympathizers in the United States.

00:27:59.100 Well, let's go back to the Middle East for a moment.

00:28:01.820 One of the things that we talk about, you know, the Ayatollah and his team, they're homicidal.

00:28:07.260 And you could also even say suicidal in their obsession with with killing, you know, innocent people in their own country, going after Americans, going after Israelis as well.

00:28:18.140 But one of the things that I was even a little bit shocked by was how quickly they decided to bring in every other country on the side of Israel and the U.S.

00:28:25.360 by attacking these other Middle Eastern nations around them that weren't involved.

00:28:29.980 Right. They were they were outside.

00:28:31.940 Were you as shocked as I was that they just decided, all right, like whoever's still left standing, let's just go after Bahrain. 0.79

00:28:38.020 Let's go after Qatar. Let's go after. 1.00

00:28:39.460 I mean, the list is pretty long now of countries they've attacked.

00:28:41.760 And now they brought them into the fold. I mean, that that to me just seems like a suicidal mission on their part.

00:28:49.200 Yeah, I will admit I was surprised by that.

00:28:52.680 There's been a lot of public reporting that suggested that other Middle Eastern nations were discouraging President Trump from going after Iran.

00:29:01.460 I'm a little bit skeptical of that.

00:29:03.240 I have not recently had those conversations with other Middle Eastern nations, but I've had many conversations with the Saudis, UAE, Bahrain.

00:29:14.160 And they have always been very focused on, number one, doing everything necessary to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon. 0.60

00:29:22.320 The Saudis have said publicly if Iran ever got a nuclear weapon, that they would do everything possible to get a nuke themselves to defend themselves from Iran. 0.91

00:29:29.860 And so I don't know if it's true or not that in the recent weeks Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern countries were urging Trump not to attack.

00:29:41.700 But I do know that Iran's behavior – so they fired missiles and sent drones and had attacks at almost every single Arab country all throughout the Middle East. 0.82

00:29:51.520 So they've attacked Saudi Arabia, they've attacked UAE, they've attacked Kuwait, they've attacked Qatar, they've attacked Bahrain, they've attacked Jordan.

00:29:59.240 And we've seen statements from many of those other Middle Eastern countries, mostly Arab countries, expressing – condemning Iran's response.

00:30:11.640 And, you know, in my view, they're just indiscriminately firing abroad.

00:30:21.000 And I think their reasoning was that if the United States and or Israel hit them, that they wanted to make it as painful as possible for the entirety of the region.

00:30:30.600 And what they have ensured is that there's basically nobody standing up and siding with the Iranians. 0.98

00:30:38.680 They're demonstrating essentially they're willing to kill anybody and everybody.

00:30:44.100 I've got to say that's also a really powerful illustration.

00:30:47.080 If that's what they do now –

00:30:48.700 Yeah.

00:30:49.540 What would they have done with a nuclear weapon?

00:30:51.440 Yeah.

00:30:51.700 Can you imagine how much worse if they had a nuclear weapon?

00:30:54.260 And during the whole – go back to Obama and the debates on Obama's terrible Iran nuclear deal.

00:31:00.860 I always said most of the debate rotated around, well, if they had a nuclear weapon, it would change the balance of power.

00:31:09.140 It would make them more aggressive.

00:31:10.360 They would fund more terrorism.

00:31:12.360 And I always said, look, that's the best-case scenario.

00:31:15.780 The best-case scenario is a horrible situation.

00:31:18.320 The worst case is that they would actually use the nuclear weapon.

00:31:21.980 And everyone operates under an assumption, well, having a nuclear weapon doesn't mean you use it.

00:31:27.760 Listen, when the Ayatollah chants death to Israel and death to America, I believe him. 1.00

00:31:34.840 When he calls Israel the little Satan and America the great Satan, I believe him. 1.00

00:31:40.800 And I think the odds are unacceptably high.

00:31:43.040 I don't know what they were, but they were unacceptably high that the Ayatollah, if he had a nuclear weapon, would detonate it.

00:31:49.400 Maybe in Tel Aviv or maybe in New York or Los Angeles.

00:31:54.320 And I don't want to wake up and discover, uh-oh, the predictions were wrong because we have a mushroom cloud and hundreds of thousands or even millions of Americans being killed.

00:32:06.280 The reason – and by the way, I've got to say a lot of the news reporting is challenging.

00:32:13.500 Why would Trump do this attack?

00:32:15.560 You heard Margaret Brennan there say Trump campaigned on not getting in wars.

00:32:21.440 I did after Face the Nation.

00:32:22.900 I also did State of the Union with Dana Bash.

00:32:25.420 And Dana Bash asked a question of me.

00:32:27.360 She said, you know, President Trump campaigned on no more wars.

00:32:33.660 And I – in my response, I said, well, Dana, you actually misquoted what the president said.

00:32:39.840 What the president said was no more forever wars.

00:32:43.140 Yeah, referring to Iraq and Afghanistan.

00:32:45.180 Right.

00:32:45.540 Totally – and troops on the ground, just completely different doctrine you can tell.

00:32:49.660 Yeah.

00:32:50.180 And I said, listen, we're not going to see troops on the ground in Iran.

00:32:54.240 We're not going to see hundreds of thousands of Americans there for an extended period of time.

00:32:57.640 I don't think we'll see that at all.

00:32:58.840 That is very different.

00:33:01.720 And I said, look, there are isolationists who want America to withdraw from the world.

00:33:07.580 Donald Trump has never been an isolationist.

00:33:10.620 And he is acting to protect America.

00:33:14.300 This is America first. 0.74

00:33:15.680 The reason we are striking Iran right now is because the odds are unacceptably high. 0.87

00:33:21.880 Iran has already killed nearly 1,000 Americans, and they have every desire to kill more. 1.00

00:33:26.420 As I told the president, driving in the beast, I said, if the Ayatollah could kill the two of us right now, he would. 0.95

00:33:33.420 The only thing that is preventing him is that he's not able to because he is trying.

00:33:38.520 And so if we have an opportunity to take out this regime – and look, my hope is we see a new government in Iran that wants to be friends with America.

00:33:50.300 That would make this country massively safer.

00:33:54.440 Removing these psychopaths from power and replacing them with anything resembling a normal government would massively improve the safety of every American.

00:34:05.420 This year marks a critical moment for our country.

00:34:08.980 As the opposition grows more aggressive and unapologetic, the fight now reaches into the everyday decisions we make.

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00:35:42.140 Two questions to wrap things up.

00:35:44.080 Number one, I thought it was really interesting to see the compare and contrast

00:35:46.960 of the women standing up for themselves in Iran on the streets, risking their lives,

00:35:51.760 while women in America were actually standing up angry at America for going into Iran. 0.54

00:35:57.080 We saw that in New York City, for example.

00:35:58.620 We saw that in some other college campuses.

00:36:01.120 The disconnect from reality from some of these leftists is amazing.

00:36:04.880 I want to get your take on that real quick.

00:36:06.500 And then also I want to talk about the possible closing straight of Hormuz and what that means

00:36:10.780 and what America's role could be in that as well.

00:36:13.380 Yeah.

00:36:13.660 So today, Comrade Mondami put out a statement that I want to read to you.

00:36:21.100 Today's military strikes on Iran, carried out by the United States and Israel, mark a catastrophic

00:36:26.940 escalation of an illegal war of aggression, bombing cities, killing civilians, opening a

00:36:32.380 new theater of war.

00:36:33.840 Americans do not want this.

00:36:35.700 They do not want another war in pursuit of regime change.

00:36:39.180 They want relief from the affordability crisis.

00:36:41.720 They want peace.

00:36:43.060 I am focused on making sure every New Yorker is safe.

00:36:46.000 I've been in contact with our police commissioner and emergency management officials.

00:36:50.100 We are taking proactive steps, including increasing coordination across agencies and enhancing

00:36:56.440 patrols of sensitive locations out of an abundance of conscience.

00:37:00.300 Caution.

00:37:00.740 Additionally, I want to speak directly to Iranian New Yorkers.

00:37:04.740 You are part of the fabric of this city.

00:37:06.700 You are our neighbors, small business owners, students, artists, workers, and community leaders.

00:37:10.740 You will be safe here.

00:37:12.140 Look, this is Comrade Mondami cheering for the Ayatollah because they are both jihadists 0.96

00:37:20.500 and they both want to see the great Satan of America.

00:37:25.760 They want to see this country fundamentally changed and to become an Islamic caliphate. 1.00

00:37:32.900 That was the Ayatollah's objective. 0.59

00:37:36.080 That sadly, I believe, is Comrade Mondami's objective.

00:37:40.240 And I want to contrast that with the reaction of protesters, Iranians, like his line to Iranians, 0.99

00:37:46.740 you will be safe here.

00:37:48.920 I know a great many Iranians.

00:37:51.020 Every Iranian I know hates the regime, is cheering. 1.00

00:37:55.140 And I want you to watch in particular this scene that played out on the ground in Austin, Texas,

00:38:01.560 and a CBS News reporter who was told don't cover the protests celebrating the Ayatollah being killed.

00:38:10.440 Cover that up.

00:38:11.220 And this brave reporter didn't do that.

00:38:13.000 Give a listen.

00:38:13.460 Give a watch.

00:38:13.920 It's incredible there.

00:38:36.100 And again, for people that can't see the video, you have this Austin CBS reporter.

00:38:41.180 He was handed the phone from his cameraman and he reads it and he's like, what does that mean?

00:38:46.020 And the cameraman responds, they don't want us to focus on this.

00:38:50.200 And this brave local reporter said, all right, well, I am.

00:38:54.040 And now it's out there on the Internet of him having this moment.

00:38:57.400 It's sad that you've got to be this brave in America at a local affiliate to report the news,

00:39:01.940 which was the news that you had people celebrating and waving American flags and Iranian flags

00:39:07.880 and standing up for the innocent people in Iran.

00:39:12.160 And they're like, no, no, no, we don't want you to focus on that at CBS.

00:39:15.340 Yeah, look, this is happening all over the country, all over America.

00:39:18.680 It's happening on the ground, on the streets of Iran.

00:39:21.320 It's happening around the world.

00:39:22.600 You know, Kamala Harris today put out a statement, quote,

00:39:25.920 Donald Trump is dragging the United States into a war the American people do not want.

00:39:30.940 Let me be clear.

00:39:32.020 I am opposed to a regime change war in Iran and our troops are being put in harm's way

00:39:36.720 for the sake of Trump's war of choice.

00:39:39.680 Now, I will tell you, I responded to her on X and I said,

00:39:42.780 your administration gave over $100 billion to the Ayatollah, who kept killing Americans. 1.00

00:39:53.640 We know you're sad that your friend isn't with us anymore.

00:39:57.640 Look, the Democrat Party was all in in support of the Ayatollah. 0.84

00:40:04.020 Now, sometimes they pretended they weren't.

00:40:05.880 But when Joe Biden and Kamala Harris sent over $100 billion, flowed that money into the Ayatollah,

00:40:10.980 they funded his terror.

00:40:14.300 The Obama-Iran nuclear deal was designed to inevitably lead to a nuclear Iran,

00:40:20.340 to the Ayatollah with nuclear weapons.

00:40:22.340 And so this is, I'll tell you, and folks that deal with conflict in the Middle East

00:40:28.800 and that deal with foreign policy frequently refer to Iran as, quote, the head of the snake.

00:40:35.720 Why do they call it the head of the snake?

00:40:37.480 Because it is what is leading and directing and funding the vast majority of the terrorism you see.

00:40:45.040 Without Iran, Hamas has no resources.

00:40:48.220 Without Iran, Hezbollah and the Houthis have no resources. 0.96

00:40:50.840 And so what President Trump is doing here is being a strong commander-in-chief

00:40:56.680 and making Americans safer.

00:40:59.480 Final question on the Strait of Hormuz and the reality of what's happening there.

00:41:03.100 Give us your thoughts and perspective on that and what you think can happen moving forward.

00:41:08.380 So we don't know that there is reporting that the Iranians may have mined the Straits of Hormuz.

00:41:14.400 So we don't have an answer to that right now.

00:41:16.700 Right now, there's not shipping.

00:41:18.120 There are not ships going through the Straits of Hormuz until it is determined whether or not they have mined it.

00:41:23.940 And to be clear, that's significant.

00:41:25.640 People just don't understand how important that is.

00:41:28.080 A significant amount of oil supply goes through there.

00:41:31.960 Yeah.

00:41:32.180 So right now, that is shut down.

00:41:33.780 By the way, right now, civilian air traffic is shut down throughout the Middle East.

00:41:37.960 You can't get on an airline and fly into and out of most of the cities in the Middle East because you've got missiles flying everywhere.

00:41:46.080 And so all of the countries have understandably shut their airspace down.

00:41:49.940 And so I am confident that we will have minesweepers go into the Straits of Hormuz.

00:41:56.760 That may be happening now.

00:41:57.760 I don't know.

00:41:58.920 And examine and determine if there are mines there.

00:42:01.340 But at least right now, you're not seeing ships go through there because these guys are just crazy enough to have put mines there.

00:42:07.760 And so no one wants to risk it until it's determined one way or another whether it's safe.

00:42:13.360 Yeah, it really is incredible.

00:42:14.920 Well, we're going to keep you updated on all this all week long.

00:42:16.940 I can promise you don't miss an episode of Verdict with Ted Cruz wherever you get your podcasts.

00:42:21.540 Hit that subscribe or auto-download button in the center.

00:42:23.700 And I will see you back here on Wednesday morning.

00:42:26.240 And if something massive breaks, we'll probably be back before then as well.

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Verdict with Ted Cruz - March 02, 2026

Iran Strike Ayatollah DEAD, Austin Shooting-Why, How & What's Next

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