Trump Ukraine Plan Wobbles; White House Warns Iran on Nuclear Program

On today's podcast:   

1) President Trump’s campaign to end the war in Ukraine faced new complications on Monday when Russian President Vladimir Putin said he would revise his country’s negotiating position after the Russian leader claimed Ukrainian drones targeted his residence. Putin told Trump of his decision in a call Monday, according to the Kremlin, even as Kyiv cast the Russian allegations as a fabrication aimed at derailing the peace process. Trump addressed the dispute while speaking to reporters in Florida, saying that Putin had told him about the purported attack during their discussion. The US president, seeming to side with Putin, said he was “very angry.”   

2) President Trump expressed concern that Iran is moving to rebuild its nuclear capabilities and bolster its ballistic missile program after strikes by the US and Israel earlier this year, and threatened to target the country again to prevent Tehran from stockpiling weapons. “Now I hear that Iran is trying to build up again, and if they are we are going to have to knock them down,” Trump said Monday at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida as he met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The president also said he would support Israel in strikes if Iran continued with its ballistic missile program, which Netanyahu highlighted earlier this year as “existential” threat along with Tehran’s nuclear development.   

3) President Trump said the US struck a facility inside Venezuela, in what would be a significant escalation in its campaign against alleged drug trafficking operations there. Trump’s reference to an attack within Venezuela would mark the first time the US has announced a land strike in the country. The administration has raised pressure on the government of Nicolas Maduro by bombing boats in the region and implementing a blockade to disrupt the country’s oil exports. Separately, the US carried out another strike on an alleged drug boat in international waters on Monday, US Southern Command announced on X, sharing a 22-second video showing a vessel being destroyed in a fiery explosion. 

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