President Donald Trump’s lawyers sent letters to the New York Times and CNN threatening to sue them for reporting leaked intelligence that suggested his strikes on Iran did not destroy the regime’s nuclear facilities.
Trump authorized seven B-2 bombers to drop 30,000-pound bunker-buster bombs on three Iranian nuclear sites on June 21, seeking to wipe out a nuclear threat that had long plagued the United States and allies in the Middle East, such as Israel. In an address to the nation immediately after the strikes, the president said the military mission “totally obliterated” the three sites, dealing an enormous blow to the regime’s nuclear ambitions.
Days later, the New York Times and CNN on June 24 published a leaked U.S. intelligence assessment of the strikes, which called the efficacy of the mission into question, suggesting Trump’s assessment was overblown and that the strikes set Iran’s nuclear program back by only a few months. The outlets reported that the Defense Intelligence Agency’s assessments were only “preliminary” and that more information was needed. As further information has been gleaned about the scope of the strikes, the U.S. intelligence community has, in the days since the leak, confirmed that Trump’s military mission did “completely destroy” the three Iranian nuclear sites bombed.
The president’s lawyers demanded in letters to the outlets that they “retract and apologize” for their reporting, which the letter described as “false,” “defamatory,” and “unpatriotic.”
The outlets defended their actions in response to Trump’s letter threatening to sue them, arguing that they had stressed in their reporting that the intelligence was preliminary and could change with additional information.
“That is what we reported,” the New York Times responded. “While the Trump administration protests that the assessments were only preliminary — which, by the way, was the second word of our Article — and that later assessments may come to different conclusions, no one in the administration disputes that the first assessments said exactly what the Article said they did: the destruction caused by the raid was not as significant as the President’s remarks suggested.”
CNN wrote: “[Our] reporting made clear that this was an initial finding that could change with additional intelligence. We have extensively covered President Trump’s own deep skepticism about it. However, we do not believe it is reasonable to criticize CNN reporters for accurately reporting the existence of the assessment and accurately characterizing its findings, which are in the public interest.”
The intelligence leaks to the media are under investigation by the Pentagon as Trump has continued to denounce the press for reporting on the preliminary assessment, calling the effort an attempt to “demean” one of the “most successful military strikes in history.”
The Trump administration has pinpointed blame particularly on the New York Times and CNN, calling for reporters to be fired due to arguments that they cherry-picked pieces from the preliminary report that downplayed the strikes’ impact, while eliminating other sections suggesting the bombers wielded critical damage to the regime’s nuclear sites.
“The document said, ‘It could be very severe damage,’ but they didn’t take that,” Trump said. “Since then, we’ve collected additional intelligence. We’ve also spoken to people who have seen the site and the site is obliterated.”
During an interview with Politico on Wednesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio also weighed in on the debacle, calling intelligence leaks “one of the most frustrating things anywhere, not just because you’ve got somebody who has access to this putting stuff out there, but because it’s so often mischaracterized.”
“An intelligence report, for anyone who’s ever seen it, sometimes is an assessment. Some analyst will make an assessment, or analysts will make an assessment. And in these leaks, what you typically have is someone who reads it and then leaks it to the media, giving it the spin and the angle they want it to have because they’ve got some purpose: to embarrass the administration, they were against the action, whatever it may be,” he said.
CNN’s Brian Stelter defended his network during a segment Thursday, accusing the Trump administration of “picking a fight” with the press and casting “legitimate journalism as unpatriotic.”
“The public still has a lot that wants to know about the impact of the strikes, but the administration is picking a fight with the press and casting legitimate journalism as unpatriotic,” he said in a statment responding to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s complaint that the press corps “cheer against Trump so hard. It’s like in your DNA and in your blood to cheer against Trump.”
“CNN did not report that this mission was a failure. Far from it. It may have turned out to be a tremendous success. We just don‘t know all the facts yet. And neither does the U.S. Government,” Stelter added. “I think the history going back to Vietnam and, more recently, the Iraq War shows that it is quite patriotic to ask these questions and hold the government to account.”
This week, the U.S. intelligence community released a string of statements standing by the president’s assertion that strikes were a resounding success.
AFTER IRAN STRIKES, TRUMP GOES NUCLEAR ON THE MEDIA
CIA Director John Ratcliffe said Wednesday that “credible” intelligence indicates Iran’s overarching nuclear program was “severely damaged” by Trump’s strikes, adding that the three nuclear facilities targeted were completely “destroyed.
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard also said Wednesday that the nuclear sites targeted by U.S bombers were “destroyed,” adding that rebuilding the Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan facilities would take “years.”