Full transcript of "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan," March 1, 2026
On this "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan" broadcast, moderated by Margaret Brennan:
- Sen. Tom Cotton, Republican of Arkansas
- Sen. Chris Murphy, Democrat of Connecticut
- Rep. Mike Turner, Republican of Ohio
- Sen. Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas
- Karim Sadjadpour from the Carnegie Endownment for international peace and former CENTCOM commander and CBS News contributor Ret. Gen. Frank McKenzie
Click here to browse full transcripts from 2026 of "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan."
MARGARET BRENNAN: Good morning, and welcome to Face the Nation.
As we come on the air, the conflict in the Middle East appears to be widening, with the U.S. and Israel in their second day of attacks against Iran. And Iran has escalated their retaliatory strikes aimed at U.S. interests in neighboring countries, as well as targets inside Israel.
The bombing kicked off early Saturday morning. The only public appearance from President Trump at this point was a video released soon after the strikes began. It included this chilling warning.
(Begin VT)
DONALD TRUMP (President of the United States): The lives of courageous American heroes may be lost, and we may have casualties. That often happens in war. But we're doing this not for now. We're doing this for the future. And it is a noble mission.
(End VT)
MARGARET BRENNAN: And that prophecy has now come true, as U.S. Central Command just released a statement announcing the first known American casualties of Operation Epic Fury. Three service members are dead and five are seriously wounded.
We will cover all angles of this ongoing conflict that has enormous international implications for the U.S.
We will start with our Charlie D'Agata in Tel Aviv.
(Begin VT)
(CHANTING)
CHARLIE D'AGATA (voice-over): Iran began 40 days of mourning for Ayatollah Ali Khamenei after state-run media confirmed that he was killed at his Tehran compound.
His successor has been announced as Alireza Arafi to lead a temporary council. But who's really in charge and where they can even meet safely is another matter. Israel Defense Forces released this video today claiming to show multiple airstrikes blowing up Iranian government headquarters this morning. CBS News cannot independently verify that claim.
Intelligence sources tell CBS News as many as 40 senior Iranian officials were killed in the first wave of strikes.
(CHANTING)
CHARLIE D'AGATA: Iran's Islamic Republican Guard Corps vowed revenge, saying they have launched the most ferocious offensive operation in the history of the Iranian armed forces towards the occupied territories and American terrorist bases.
On day two of the war, nearby Gulf state allies have already borne the brunt of multiple drone and missile strikes, though none as hard as Israel itself. An Iranian missile strike overnight in the heart of Tel Aviv left a woman in her 40s dead and more than 40 injured, including seven children.
Throughout the night, air raid sirens and text messages sent residents here scrambling for their bomb shelters. This missile managed to hit through one of the most advanced missile defense systems in the world. And that's what's causing concern among U.S. forces here.
U.S. military officials tell CBS News that forces from U.S. Central Command continue to launch airstrikes and cruise missiles against Iran targeting Iranian air defenses, launchers and missile stockpiles and Iranian regime infrastructure in coordination with Israeli Defense Forces.
(End VT)
CHARLIE D'AGATA: Today, the U.S. Embassy here in Israel changed its advisory to American citizens here, saying the embassy is not in a position to evacuate or directly assist Americans in departing Israel, directing that all U.S. government employees and their family members shelter in place in or near their residences until further notice.
MARGARET BRENNAN: That's our Charlie D'Agata in Tel Aviv.
We turn now to senior foreign correspondent Imtiaz Tyab, who's reporting from Muscat, Oman.
(Begin VT)
(EXPLOSION)
MAN #1: Oh, my God.
(EXPLOSION)
IMTIAZ TYAB (voice-over): Tehran's decision to bring its fight to the doorsteps of Gulf nations will likely only harden Arab rulers' backing for the ongoing U.S. and Israeli strikes.
(EXPLOSION)
MAN #2: Wow.
IMTIAZ TYAB: For two days now, waves of Iranian attacks have rattled the UAE's swankiest Dubai resorts, has seen smoke billow across the skyline of Qatar's glittering capital, Doha…
(SHOUTING)
MAN #3: Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God.
IMTIAZ TYAB: … while targets have been struck in Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and now Oman's Manama port.
Beyond the damage, dozens have been injured and some killed across the region…
(EXPLOSION)
IMTIAZ TYAB: … after Iran fired hundreds of its drones and missiles. While most have been intercepted and no Gulf nation has fired back, the question now is, for how long?
The oil-and-gas-rich region is also home to several major U.S. military bases housing tens of thousands of American service members. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has said his country's armed forces will – quote – "crush U.S. bases with force."
(SHOUTING)
IMTIAZ TYAB: Fears of an extended conflict beyond Iran's borders are only growing following the killing of the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
(SHOUTING)
IMTIAZ TYAB: Pro-regime demonstrators in neighboring Pakistan tried to storm the U.S. consulate in the port city of Karachi. At least nine people were killed in confrontations with security forces.
(GUNFIRE)
IMTIAZ TYAB: Protests have also erupted in Iraq. Hundreds were pushed back with water cannons outside the Green Zone in Baghdad, just a short distance from the American Embassy.
(End VT)
IMTIAZ TYAB: And from here in the Omani capital, Muscat, not far from the banks of the Strait of Hormuz, CBS News can confirm that two tankers have been targeted in strikes.
With one-fifth of the world's oil passing through here, any sustained disruption would be felt not just in the Gulf, Margaret, but in markets across the U.S. and around the world.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Imtiaz Tyab reporting from Muscat, Oman.
We turn now to the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Arkansas Republican Tom Cotton, who joins us from Bentonville.
Good morning to you, Senator.
SENATOR TOM COTTON (R-Arkansas): Good morning, Margaret.
MARGARET BRENNAN: The president of the United States warned the American public that there could be casualties, American casualties. Does that mean the U.S. is putting boots on the ground?
SENATOR TOM COTTON: No, Margaret, the president has been clear that what we should expect to see is an extended air and naval campaign that's designed not only to continue to set back Iran's nuclear ambitions, but, most importantly, to destroy its vast missile arsenal, many more missiles than the United States and Israel have air defenses combined, as well as the missile launchers and its missile manufacturing capability.
Now, obviously one risk of that kind of campaign is that an aircraft could be shot down, and the president would never leave a pilot behind. So no doubt we have combat search-and-rescue assets in the region that are prepared to go in and extract any downed pilot.
But, barring that kind of unusual circumstance, Margaret, the president has no plan for any kind of large-scale ground force inside of Iran.
MARGARET BRENNAN: "The New York Times" is reporting that it was the CIA that provided the intelligence in regard to the exact location of the supreme leader, and then he was subsequently killed.
You're smiling as I say that. Are you confirming that it is true that it is the United States that pinpointed his location, leading to his death?
SENATOR TOM COTTON: No, Margaret, I can't confirm anything about the intelligence that the United States intelligence community collects.
I can tell you that, of course, we have exquisite intelligence collection methods, that the location and the intentions of the supreme leader and the other ayatollahs in Iran, or, for that matter, the leaders of other adversaries around the world, is obviously one of the highest priorities of our intelligence community.
But, clearly, this operation is driven by intelligence, collected by Israel and the United States that has once again proven that our nations have capabilities that no other nation on Earth has.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Indeed.
There are questions, though, about what happens next. Secretary of State Marco Rubio testified to Congress last month and was asked specifically, what happens if Iran's regime fails? Take a listen.
(Begin VT)
MARCO RUBIO (U.S. Secretary of State): So, I don't think anyone can give you a simple answer as to what happens next in Iran if the supreme leader and the regime were to fall, other than the hope that there would be some ability to have somebody within their systems that you could work towards a similar transition.
(End VT)
MARGARET BRENNAN: That was a month ago. We're seeing some succession planning happening inside Iran. Is this a managed regime change here, or is the United States betting on regime collapse?
SENATOR TOM COTTON: Well, Margaret, first, I want to stress what happens next in the days ahead and probably the weeks ahead.
Iran does have a vast missile arsenal, and that's going to be the priority objective for this military campaign. It is destroying that arsenal that threatened American troops from bases as far-flung as the Indian Ocean to Western Europe, and making sure Iran can't rebuild it…
MARGARET BRENNAN: Many of those are being fired right now.
SENATOR TOM COTTON: As far as the future – well, we're – but we're stopping a lot of them from being fired before Iran can fire them. It's much easier to kill the archer on the ground than it is to shoot his arrows out of the sky.
As far as the long-term future of Iran's government, Secretary Rubio is right. I don't think anyone can give you a simple answer. There's probably a lot of jockeying inside of Iran right now. They have a very consultative, deliberative process to replace the supreme leader. There's a reason why he didn't want to have a clear succession plan in place.
It's hard to do that when the United States is pummeling their leadership every moment of the day. I'm sure, though, that there are also some supreme – or there are also some leaders inside of Iran who might be jockeying to audition for the role of Iran's Delcy Rodriguez.
MARGARET BRENNAN: OK, but what you just described in terms of Delcy Rodriguez sounds like it is a managed transition, not regime change. Is that accurate?
SENATOR TOM COTTON: Margaret, again, as Secretary Rubio said, it's not a simple answer.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Right, but we're in the middle of it now, so don't you need an answer?
SENATOR TOM COTTON: We're going to continue to hit not just their military capabilities.
MARGARET BRENNAN: At least an outcome, a goal?
SENATOR TOM COTTON: But we're going to continue to hit their military capabilities, and we're going to continue to hit their senior leadership, the ayatollahs, who have also been complicit in 47 years of heinous crimes, not only against Americans, but against their own people.
Again, there's no simple answer for what's going to come next.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
SENATOR TOM COTTON: But as President Trump promised last month when the Iranian people were rising up against their own regime, help is on the way. Help has arrived.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, exactly.
You're talking about what comes next, but then you're also telling me you don't know what comes next. So, do you believe that regime change is possible from air support alone? Has a leader of the opposition been identified? Is the opposition unified to deliver in a way that President Trump is calling on the people to do? Are we arming anyone to actually challenge the regime?
SENATOR TOM COTTON: Margaret, the opposition is 90 million Iranians who have suffered under the brutal Islamic Republic Revolutionary regime for the last 47 years.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes, and the president…
SENATOR TOM COTTON: We've seen in recent months that there's…
MARGARET BRENNAN: … called them to take over their government.
SENATOR TOM COTTON: And – and we would all celebrate if the Iranian people were able to rise up and reclaim their freedom and reclaim their destiny.
And as the president said when he promised help is on the way, help has arrived. And that's why you've already seen some protests out celebrating the death of the supreme leader, the man who has brutally repressed his own people for almost 40 years.
Now, we can't necessarily dictate what course that is going to take, but the help that the president promised is on the scene, and it's going to continue to be on the scene for probably a few weeks, as we make sure that Iran's military is no longer capable of threatening our own troops, our Arab friends in the region and Israel, and also repressing its own people.
MARGARET BRENNAN: This is a big gamble by the president. Before the strikes, according to CBS polling, 74 percent of Americans said that Trump would need approval from Congress for military action against Iran. He did not seek that.
If this operation takes weeks, which is how you described it, do you believe the administration has effectively made its case to the American public to expect casualties to support this action?
SENATOR TOM COTTON: Margaret, I thought the president's eight-minute video yesterday was outstanding. It laid out Iran's 47-year campaign of terror and revolutionary violence against the United States and our people and really the civilized world.
I'm sure the president will speak more in the coming days. We will have briefings to Congress.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Forty-seven years. He did not describe imminence or justify that in that video. Do you believe that the American public is owed something more than a Twitter video?
SENATOR TOM COTTON: Margaret, I think an eight-minute address to the American people, whether the president posted on social media or whether it happens on your network, is in keeping with presidential custom of addressing the American people.
Again, I'm sure that he's going to be speaking more in coming days. The administration will be briefing Congress, and we're going to have a vote in the Congress. The Democrats are forcing a vote.
MARGARET BRENNAN: On the War Powers Act.
SENATOR TOM COTTON: I expect there'll be overwhelming Republican support for our troops, for the – for our troops, and for the president's decision to finally eliminate the threat of Iran.
And I would invite Democrats in the Congress to join their Democratic colleagues like John Fetterman and Josh Gottheimer and Greg Landsman in supporting our troops in finally putting America's foot down against the Islamic Republic of Iran.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Senator Cotton, we appreciate you in your role in oversight of the Intelligence Committee making the case for the administration. We have more questions, and we would love to put them to the administration as well.
Thank you very much for your time this morning.
Face the Nation will be back in one minute. Stay with us.
(ANNOUNCEMENTS)
MARGARET BRENNAN: Joining us now is Connecticut Democratic Senator Chris Murphy.
Good morning.
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY (D-Connecticut): Good morning.
MARGARET BRENNAN: You have called for Congress to return to Washington and to vote on whether to try to essentially halt this military action.
No war powers Resolution has ever overcome a presidential veto. Why do you think you need to take one?
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: Well, nobody in this country is asking for war with Iran, just like, months ago, no one in this country was asking for war with Venezuela.
This president is intentionally tanking our economy. He's the most corrupt president in the history of our nation. And Americans want him to focus on the crises here at home. Instead, he is busy getting us involved in quagmires overseas that already are becoming deadly to American soldiers.
This is a disaster. It is illegal. And the president is obligated under the Constitution to come to Congress and ask for an authorization of military force.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: He wouldn't get that authorization if he asked for it. Congress wouldn't vote to give him the permission to do it, but he's obligated to come to Congress.
MARGARET BRENNAN: The administration would argue Venezuela was a limited military operation. They see – they're not explaining to the public yet, beyond that Twitter video, exactly what the plan is here.
But the president has tweeted, in a way, describing this as an open-ended conflict until peace is achieved. You are using the term war. You do consider this to be a war?
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: Oh, of course.
We are engaged in regular, ongoing military strikes that have – that has already killed American soldiers with the goal of regime change. If that is not war, what is? Now, the president has said that the goal is regime change, and the goal is to eliminate Iran's missile program and their nuclear program.
He is not going to succeed in either of those endeavors. His intelligence agencies have already told him that the most likely outcome is that hard- line members of the IRGC replace the current leadership. So we're not going to get a democracy. We're going to get an even worse Iranian leadership.
We already know that you can't bomb their nuclear program out of existence. He told us last year that he had obliterated the program. And then, apparently, over the course of the last year…
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: … they had gotten back to within a week.
So we're going to have Americans dying, and the end result is going to be hard-line leadership continues in Iran…
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: … and we don't get rid of their nuclear program? That's a moral and strategic disaster for the country.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, you're summarizing the administration's views in perhaps a more succinct way than they have, because we haven't even heard a clear public accounting of the state of their nuclear program. Rubio said they weren't enriching. Witkoff said something else.
But I want to ask you about something in regard to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, where you sit. The State Department has issued a worldwide caution alert to all Americans. They have set up a task force that they say they're going to try to figure out how to help the Americans who are trapped in the Middle East and throughout the world.
But the U.S. Embassy in Israel said they're closed and they can't help evacuate. If you're an American abroad or a family member, what should you be doing right now?
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: Well, I think you can call your member of Congress or your senator. We will do whatever we can to help.
But it's no secret that this administration has no plan for the chaos that is unfolding right now in the Middle East. Those scenes that you showed at the beginning of the program are frightening. Violence is not contained just to the Middle East. It's spilling over into Pakistan and other parts of the world.
And it's no secret that our allies in the region, with the exception of the right-wing government in Israel, had begged us not to take this action, because they knew that the spillover, which is now looking like regional conflict, was the likely outcome.
So, again, what are we getting out of this? We're not getting regime change to a democracy. We're not going to eliminate their nuclear program. We are going to have regional war breaking out. It won't be the billionaire kids of Donald Trump and his buddies that die. It's going to be the children of middle-class and poor families all across this country who are going to die for a war of choice, a war of vanity, an illegal war.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, we are going to hope for more briefings to Congress or engagement with the press to explain some of these things.
When we are talking about the Americans, though, around the world right now, there's also from the FBI and Homeland Security concern about cyber vulnerabilities and potential threats to infrastructure. They have put out alerts about this.
Given the current situation, Republicans are calling on Democrats to consider stopping the position you've taken, which is to halt some funding to Homeland Security. Do you feel you need to reconsider this position?
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: So, the Republicans are saying that, because they launched an illegal, disastrous war in Iran, we should give them permission to continue using ICE to murder American citizens, to allow them to get the funding to tear gas schools?
No, we need to stand up for the American citizens that ICE is murdering, the kids that they are terrorizing. They should stop this illegal war and they should stop ICE from terrorizing our communities. We should demand that they do both things.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, the administration would say they have adjusted some of the way they're carrying out policies within DHS.
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: They have not. They have not.
I mean, just because some of the world's and the nation's attention has turned away from Minneapolis, that doesn't mean that they aren't still brutalizing American citizens. We just discovered last week that they had left a Burmese immigrant for dead five miles from his home blind and disabled.
This brutality is continuing in the country. We can do two things at once. We can demand that ICE stop murdering American citizens, and we can demand that the administration not send our kids to die for a war that we don't need.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So you believe that, with the current funding Homeland Security has, that they are able to protect the homeland in an adequate fashion? That's what I hear you saying.
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: Listen, I believe that the administration should make a commitment to legally prosecuting the laws of this nation.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: I don't have any obligation to fund a Department of Homeland Security that is violating the law every day, just like I don't have any obligation to support this war that is illegal as well.
MARGARET BRENNAN: It doesn't – so three weeks and counting. It sounds like the standoff is not ending.
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: Well, if they agree to start adhering to the law at the Department of Homeland Security, they'll have the votes immediately.
But, listen, this is what the people want. The people want ICE to start behaving legally, and they don't want wars overseas. So I think this is a pretty clear case of Democrats standing with the American people when it comes to domestic crises and international crises.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So, back on Iran.
If there had been a briefing, if there had been full disclosure of the state of negotiations or an assessment of Iran's nuclear program, would Democrats have been persuadable to support military action? I ask that because the Biden administration initially had reached out to Iran to try to get to a negotiated deal, and they weren't able to get one, in part because they weren't willing to lift sanctions off of the IRGC.
So, in other words, are we just in a place where military conflict or confrontation was inevitable, and it just happened to land on Donald Trump's watch?
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: No, Donald Trump precipitated this crisis, right?
He inherited a nuclear agreement that was working that had put Iran more than a year away from a nuclear weapon.
MARGARET BRENNAN: The JCPOA.
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: The JCPOA.
Against the advice of his advisers, he tossed that agreement out, which brought us to this moment.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Right. It would have expired by now.
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: And there – right, but I think Iran would have certainly been willing to extend those provisions if we were still in the agreement.
But, second, there is no history, there is no experience that shows an air campaign alone will result in positive regime change. In fact, there's not a single example of it in the entirety of American history. An air campaign without at least the threat of a ground invasion, which the administration is ruling out, never results in a democratic rebirth in an authoritarian country.
So the plan they have laid out, sustained air strikes without a ground invasion, is destined to fail. All that will happen at the end of this, most likely – listen, I'm rooting for democracy in Iran, but the most likely outcome here is that hard-liners take over the government…
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: … they restart their missile program, they restart their nuclear program, and we're just right back at bombing them again and putting American lives and regional lives at risk again in a year or two.
MARGARET BRENNAN: All right, Senator Murphy, thank you…
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: Thank you.
MARGARET BRENNAN: … for your time this morning.
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY: Appreciate it.
MARGARET BRENNAN: And we'll be right back with a lot more Face the Nation.
Stay with us.
(ANNOUNCEMENTS)
MARGARET BRENNAN: And welcome back to Face the Nation.
We will be joined shortly by Republican Mike Turner, who sits on the House Armed Services Committee. And, ahead, we will be speaking to Senator Ted Cruz. We have been having some audio problems with him, but we are hoping that we can get him up and live from Texas soon.
So, stay with us.
(ANNOUNCEMENTS)
MARGARET BRENNAN: We're joined now by Ohio Republican Congressman Mike Turner.
Congressman, you are on the Armed Services Committee. I know you've been in contact with the administration to understand what is going on.
The ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, Mark Warner, was briefed by Secretary Rubio, and he is calling this – Warner is, a war of choice. He said there was "no evidence of imminent harm to Americans or an imminent threat to our country."
Were you informed of a specific and imminent threat to the United States?
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER (R-OH): Well, this issue of imminent is really this fallacy of the – really that comes from the Obama administration's – the nuclear weapons – the nuclear enrichment negotiations, where the Obama administration, the JCPOA, set up this fallacy, that we were just going to set up, you know, cameras and watch Iran do this nuclear enrichment until they got all the way to a nuclear weapon and then they were going to kick to the next administration whether or not there was going to be a military conflict, which is what we've come down to.
MARGARET BRENNAN: There's a pretty detailed international accord with stages.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: But –
MARGARET BRENNAN: There were parts that sunset. But –
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: But this concept of imminent. I mean, as we just saw from the international –
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, that's separate and apart from imminent threat to justify U.S. military force.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: No, but it's not because it goes to really this inherent policy that we see that has, you know, a thread that's come through the Democrat side that we still see from the Democratic Obama administration's policies of what is imminent. Imminent here really is that the Iranian regime continues to be a sponsor of terrorism, an amassing of missiles and inventory, where they have declared themselves an enemy of the United States and of our allies –
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: Where they've committed themselves to nuclear enrichment, and refused to declare themselves as not pursuing a nuclear weapon. And have –
MARGARET BRENNAN: They said they weren't.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: Well, actually, they have – they have not. As we have seen, even –
MARGARET BRENNAN: There were. The foreign minister (INAUDIBLE).
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: Even just last year we had the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency saying that they were just mere months away from being able to have several nuclear warheads. So, this – this imminent issue –
MARGARET BRENNAN: No, had enough materiel to make –
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: This imminent issue is one where people want to have them, you know, be, you know, with their hand almost on the button –
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: To something that has been completely assembled. In this instance, the administration has declared that they had information, an imminent aspect of that Iran was a threat, both to us and to Israel, our ally, and had the opportunity to take an action to eliminate that threat. That's important. We don't have to wait – we don't have to wait.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Sorry, which threat though? Because the president said the nuclear threat was obliterated. And none of the nuclear sites have been hit in this round.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: No, no, he said at those sites that we had taken action to eliminate, where there are nuclear enrichment sites, that we had obliterated those sites. But they had continued to amass missile technology and missile inventory. They had continued as has – had been declared to pursue their intention of nuclear enrichment. They had continued –
MARGARET BRENNAN: Rubio said they weren't enriching.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: They had continued their intention to pursue nuclear enrichment. They had said and declared that they were going to do that. Their programs had not been completely abolished. And their intention had not been abolished. They remained a threat.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: And the fact that we had the ability to intervene, that imminence is incredibly important.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: This standard of what is imminent, I mean, you
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, people want to know why. Why now? That's a – that's why I'm asking.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: Because the opportunity is there to eliminate an imminent threat that is an imminent threat to the United States and the operations and in the area and our ally.
MARGARET BRENNAN: I want to ask you about another standoff between the Pentagon and Anthropic, which is the only A.I. company whose products are used on classified systems for things like target I.D., intel assessments and battlefield assimilations. This morning "The Wall Street Journal" is reporting that their A.I. was, in fact, used in these operations, even though Secretary Hegseth and Trump ordered it to be cut off due to this contractual dispute over the use of the model. Anthropic's CEO told CBS in an exclusive interview that it is up to Congress to act here, to really create clarity as to how A.I. can be used. It's clearly essential if the Pentagon's still using it in this operation. Will Congress act here?
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: I – you know, this is something that they're going to have to deal with and come to Congress before this is – I – you know, obviously in this –
MARGARET BRENNAN: The administration have to come –
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: In this particular circumstance, I'm unaware of this particular issue. This is going to have to be something that is going to have to be dealt with in more detail than, obviously, an interview on CBS.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Can I ask you, in that targeting of the supreme leader, that secretary – that Senator Cotton talked about, did the U.S. carry out that strike?
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: Well, I think this is very important. The – what's very clear here, and I think this is important to discuss. You know, the president of the United States indicated that we were targeting the military, military infrastructure, and not the regime and not regime change. And yesterday when I had the opportunity to talk to Secretary Rubio, you know, I asked that question, and he was very clear in the answer, that we did not target Khamenei and the – and we were not targeting the leadership in Iran. So, the aspect of that the United States was not undertaking regime change is very important. Our aspect of what the president of the United States has undertaken was this imminent threat that he described in his announcement and that, I think, his response and his statement to the United States is an important aspect.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes. But you – just to be clear, you're not saying that Israel carried out that strike without the U.S.' permission green lighting buy-in (ph)?
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: You know, the fact that Khamenei has been a murderous authoritarian –
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: Who has killed an unbelievable number of Israelis –
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: They have absolutely, I think, a strong basis in which to do so.
MARGARET BRENNAN: OK.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: I think it certainly shows that if you're a murderous authoritarian and you are – and you –
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well –
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: That you're at risk and your – it's better to be a friend of the United States than a murderous authoritarian.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well –
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: You know, it's also interesting that Putin just said –
MARGARET BRENNAN: I would – speaking of murderous dictators.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: That he lost – that he lost – that he – that he lost a friend in losing Khamenei.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes. Yes.
REPRESENTATIVE MIKE TURNER: And we certainly didn't see Khamenei as a friend.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, we will leave it there, Congressman Turner.
We'll be back in a moment with more "FACE THE NATION."
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MARGARET BRENNAN: We go now to Texas Republican Senator Ted Cruz, who joins us from Austin.
Good morning to you, Senator.
I'm glad we got your audio working. You're from Houston, I believe, this morning.
SENATOR TED CRUZ (R-TX): I am. Good morning, Margaret.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Good morning.
I wanted to ask you about Austin, though, because there are reports of three people dead, more than a dozen injured following a mass shooting in that city. The FBI is saying this morning that their joint terrorism task force has joined the investigation. Is there any nexus to terrorism or anything that is going on in regard to the worldwide caution at this moment?
SENATOR TED CRUZ: We don't know for sure. There are some early reports that this shooting may be connected to terrorism. But we need to follow the evidence and see in particular what motivated the shooting. We are certainly – Heidi and I are praying for those who are wounded and the families of those who were killed. But at this point, we don't know what the evidence will show in terms of whether this was an act of terrorism.
MARGARET BRENNAN: We'll continue to follow those early reports.
Senator, just looking at the global environment right now, CENTCOM announced three Americans were killed and five seriously wounded in this operation. President Trump and Vice President Vance campaigned on not getting America involved in new wars. What do you say to Americans this morning who are asking why we are in this conflict now?
SENATOR TED CRUZ: President Trump's decision to launch this decisive action against Iran is the single most important decision of his presidency. I think he laid out powerfully and effectively why he is taking this action. He is taking this action because the government of Iran is a profound and maligned influence. They have been the leading state sponsor of terrorism for 47 years. They have over that time killed nearly 1,000 Americans. They provide more than 90 percent of the funding for Hamas. They provide more than 90 percent of the funding for Hezbollah. The Iranian ayatollah was, until yesterday, actively trying to murder the president of the United States, Donald J. Trump.
I spent the entire day with President Trump on Friday, right before he launched these attacks. He and I discussed this at length on Friday. My counsel to him was that the Iranian regime has never been weaker, that it was teetering and now was the time.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
SENATOR TED CRUZ: My advice was, do not miss this opportunity. I think the president has acted boldly. He's acted decisively. And Iran no longer being led by a theocratic, murderous dictator, that makes America much, much safer.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes. But, Senator, you are not going to find a lot of people in any way defending the supreme leader, that is for sure. However, putting Americans in harm's way is what I'm pressing you on here.
Did the president explain to you why he called off active diplomacy? Because at the very same time he was on that plane, the vice president of the United States was talking to the Omani mediator, who was trying to get a deal, and told us that they were close to one. Why not choose diplomacy?
SENATOR TED CRUZ: Because the diplomacy was an adject failure. The Iranians approached the diplomacy with arrogance, which – with absolute hubris. They said they would not stop enriching. No matter what, they were going to continue to enrich uranium. They would not discuss zero enrichment. They claimed a right to enrich uranium in underground bunkers with no supervision. As President Trump said on Friday, when he was with me in Texas, his line was zero enrichments, and the Iranians refused to discuss it. They also refused to discuss their proxies. They refused to discuss Hamas and Hezbollah and the Houthis. And President Trump understood that the Iranian, quote, negotiation, was just a stall tactic and that the only response – my advice to him, I said, there's only one deal you should accept, and it's the deal that you offered Maduro, which is, if you want to leave and flee the country, you can do so. Anything else is unacceptable. And Khamenei made his choice.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, there is disputes there in terms of your characterization of what was actually on the table and what the administration had indicated it was willing to accept in terms of allowing enrichment for medical purposes and the like. But I – but that's now obviously done.
SENATOR TED CRUZ: So, Margaret, what I just told you –
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
SENATOR TED CRUZ: What I just told you is almost word for word what Secretary of State Marco Rubio told me yesterday.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Can you tell us now, if you believe that there was an ongoing nuclear weapons program, one of the top arms control experts out there, David Albright, has written, "there should be an immediate priority on rapid response operations to secure Iran's nuclear stockpiles right now."
Can you assure the public that it will be secured, and if so, who is doing it if there are no Israeli or U.S. forces on the ground?
SENATOR TED CRUZ: So, there is no doubt that a year ago Iran had an active and ongoing nuclear weapons program. We took out the vast majority of that at the end of the 12-day war, where Israel had taken out –
MARGARET BRENNAN: That U.S. intelligence assessment was not made public, if that is what was briefed to you.
SENATOR TED CRUZ: 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 on those underground facilities, facilities like Fordo, which was built into the base of a mountain. The bunker buster bombs we used, Israel doesn't have those bombs.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Right.
SENATOR TED CRUZ: No other country has those bombs. We took them out last year. The Iranians were still hellbent on rebuilding them. And one of the things we are doing right now is taking out their missiles, in particular the southern missile belt. Right now Iran is building roughly 100 missiles a month. They're actively building missiles to threaten their neighbors. And I would point out –
MARGARET BRENNAN: They're firing some of them right now at their neighbors.
SENATOR TED CRUZ: Yes.
MARGARET BRENNAN: At our allies.
SENATOR TED CRUZ: They're illustrating powerfully, they're attacking virtually every Arab neighbor that surrounds them, they are firing missiles that – it's almost like they want to illustrate to the world just how maligned they are.
MARGARET BRENNAN: But in terms of containing the risk, who's securing the nuclear material that you say still exists within Iran? Who's doing that?
SENATOR TED CRUZ: Look, the quantity of nuclear materiel, I didn't say one – anything one way or another on that. What I said is they were building nuclear weapons a year ago and our bombing took that out.
They also had an ongoing desire to rebuild them. I don't have present day intelligence on what progress they had made towards rebuilding nuclear weapons since we bombed their facilities.
MARGARET BRENNAN: OK.
SENATOR TED CRUZ: I have no indication that they were anywhere close to getting nuclear weapons –
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
SENATOR TED CRUZ: Because our bombing was devastating.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
SENATOR TED CRUZ: And, Margaret, that's one of the reasons I urged President Trump, now is the time.
You know, dictatorships survive because they're perceived as invulnerable.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
SENATOR TED CRUZ: In this instance, Iran decisively lost the 12-day war. That weakened the regime and set up what the president is doing now.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Senator Ted Cruz, we have to leave it there for today. Thank you for joining us.
SENATOR TED CRUZ: Yes.
MARGARET BRENNAN: We'll be right back with a lot more "FACE THE NATION." Stay with us.
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MARGARET BRENNAN: We're joined now by Iran policy analyst Karim Sadjadpour, who is with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, as well as former CENTCOM commander and CBS News contributor, retired General Frank McKenzie, who joins us from Tampa this morning.
It's good to have both of you here.
This is such a dynamic situation right now. Karim, I want to start with you. Apparently, President Trump has told "The Atlantic" that he's willing to talk to the new leadership of Iran. Who is the new leadership of Iran?
KARIM SADJADPOUR (Senior Fellow, Carnegie Endowment For International Peace): I don't think that's even clear inside Tehran who is the new leadership. You know, this is one of the most unpopular regimes in the world. And I'm skeptical that there's going to be anyone who is palatable for both the senior clergy, the Revolutionary Guards, and 90 million Iranians. There's probably no government in the world with a greater gap between its government and its people than Iran.
So, I'm skeptical there is going to be any single figure who can immediately fill the enormous void of Ayatollah Khamenei.
MARGARET BRENNAN: General McKenzie, what Karim is sketching out here sounds like chaos. It sounds like the potential setting for civil war. Is that how you would assess what we might be seeing come next?
GENERAL FRANK MCKENZIE (Ret., Former Commander, U.S. Central Command and CBS News Contributor): I think we're still in the early stages of this campaign. There are several days of continued strikes ahead of us from Central Command and from Israel to reduce the Iranian ability to volley fire rockets at us. We'll see how that progresses in the next few days.
The leadership targets have clearly had an effect. And I believe the loss of Iranian effective national level command and control is going to have a pernicious effect on their ability to wage this war.
As to what might follow, whether it's civil war or a fractured state, don't know. Actually, for me, it's hard to see how it could be worse than what we had before.
MARGARET BRENNAN: General, you know this morning we have CENTCOM acknowledging at least three American deaths, five seriously wounded. These are just the opening hours. But it does appear that the situation is only escalating. What should the American people be prepared for?
GENERAL FRANK MCKENZIE: The American people should be prepared for several more days of exchanges of long-range rockets. We're going to continue to strike them with our aircraft, with our t-lands, our Tomahawk land attack missiles. And the essential calculus over the next 72 to 96 hours, Margaret, is going to be whether or not we can reduce the Iranian ability to generate volleys, and by volleys I mean groups of missile that are fired at our bases in the region. It's hard for them to generate a lot of missiles at Israel because of the range and just – for various reasons. But what we want to do is we don't want to let them fire large numbers of rockets at Al-Udeid Air Bases, for example, Al-Dhafra Air Base, or the cities of our friends in the region, which they have done indiscriminately. So, that's going to be a key thing to watch over next 72 to 96 hours.
CENTCOM has planned for this for years. We probably going to – we're probably going to take more casualties. I think the president's comments actually were spot on when he warned the American people that this wasn't going to be – it wasn't going to be a cakewalk. I think he knows that. And I – but I think, you know, we're probably going to have more casualties before this is over. I hope we can certainly minimize those.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
GENERAL FRANK MCKENZIE: And I know that our commanders in the region are doing everything they can to keep those numbers down.
MARGARET BRENNAN: We have seen already some civilian casualties in some of those gulf states who are taking the incoming.
Karim, the president, you've heard all of our Republican guests say the president laid this out very clearly. What I heard in that eight-minute video was a recitation of 50 years of Iran's malicious activities, everything from the bombing of the Marine barracks in 1983 by Hezbollah, the taking over the embassy, all sorts of different things, even linked the attack on the Naval destroyer in Yemen to Iran, even though it's often attributed to al Qaeda. It was just sort of an argument Iran is bad. We haven't necessarily gotten the detail on the immediate threat to the United States.
You've been watching this so closely. When the president said at the end of his video that the Iranian people should rise up, is there any chance that the Iranian people can do that?
KARIM SADJADPOUR: That is a possibility, Margaret. As I said, this is an incredibly unpopular regime. I think they probably have at best 15 support at right the moment. The Iranian people are spectators, not yet participants. President Trump also implored them to initially stay home for the next few days, says it's unsafe.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes.
KARIM SADJADPOUR: And then to seize their institutions. And so, I think people are watching very carefully to see if there are any splits within the regime. But, you know, they say about dictatorships that their – that their most murderous at the beginning when – at the beginning of the reign and at the end of the reign. And we saw this regime massacre potentially tens of thousands of people last month. And the question is whether they still have that coercive and cohesive security forces to continue to do the same.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yes, we're listening there and seeing some audio from celebrations among some people at the news of the ayatollah's death.
You have written, and I thought this was pretty eloquent, "Ayatollah Khamenei lived by death to America and death to Israel. He died by death from America and Israel." What does this mean for the Islamic Republic to have him gone?
KARIM SADJADPOUR: He was the longest serving dictator in the world. For four decades he reigned over Iran. For most Iranians, three quarters of whom were born after the revolution, he was the only ruler they ever knew.
And I think this is a society – I would describe it as perhaps the most secular society in the Muslim Middle East, perhaps the most pro-American society in the Middle East. And people – Iranians recognize, they'll never fulfill their enormous potential as a nation so long as the ethos of their government is death to America and death to Israel. And so, there's an enormous demand for a government which, perhaps not democratic, but puts national interests before revolutionary ideology.
MARGARET BRENNAN: General McKenzie, very quickly, have you heard an end game? How does America declare victory here?
GENERAL FRANK MCKENZIE: Well, first of all, Margaret, we need to have an endgame in view. But we shouldn't be thinking about an off ramp right now. We need to think about continuing to impose our will on the enemy and continuing this fight at a very high level.
Yes, there's an end game. And for me, at least, and end game would be, either you get a regime that you can negotiate with, a new regime, that may be unlikely, but I'm – but our history of predicting regime changes in the Middle East of totalitarian states is uniformly poor.
The other alternative is, you get some kind of successor state that you might be able to cut a deal with. While it may be unpalatable in some dimensions, nonetheless you may get a regime that's going to talk to you about the nuclear program or the ballistic missile program.
MARGARET BRENNAN: OK. All right, General –
GENERAL FRANK MCKENZIE: So, I think there is an end state in view.
MARGARET BRENNAN: We will watch for it.
General McKenzie, Karim, thank you for your time.
And thank you all for watching. Until next week, and it's been a busy one, for "FACE THE NATION," I'm Margaret Brennan.
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