Democratic senators said they were left with questions Thursday about what the Trump administration has largely trumpeted as a successful strike in Iran.
Many lawmakers cautioned the damage done to Iran’s nuclear program may fall short of the Trump administration’s claims.
CIA Director John Ratcliffe and other top intelligence officials briefed lawmakers for the first time about the Saturday strike — a meeting held as Trump administration officials have worked overtime to push their argument that the attacks left Iran’s nuclear facilities “obliterated.”
“The point is: We don’t know,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.). “Anybody who says we know with certainty is making it up because we have no final battle damage assessment.”
“Certainly, this mission was successful insofar as it extensively destroyed and perhaps severely damaged and set back the Iranian nuclear arms program. But how long and how much really remains to be determined by the intelligence community itself,” he added.
Reports emerged Tuesday about a preliminary assessment that said the U.S. strikes may have set the Iranian nuclear program back by “a few months.” The administration has pushed back forcefully at those reports, including at a Pentagon briefing earlier Thursday.
Some Democrats criticized Trump’s assessment that the plants were obliterated, which they widely viewed as overzealous, especially after seeing the latest information in the classified setting.
“I hope that is the final assessment,” said Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), the ranking member on the Intelligence Committee. “But if not, does that end up providing a false sense of comfort for the American people?”
Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) said all of the descriptions of the damage to the program were fitting.
“Everybody’s got their own words: set back, obliterated, destroyed, greatly diminished. It’s all of those things. I would say, I think all those are accurate, depending on how you use any one of those terms,” Cramer said.
But pressed to select his own term, Cramer paused.
“I would say that it is severely set back. And not just because the bunker busters were so effective at Fordow and the other sites that got hit by the missiles. And just to build a building like that would take probably a year, just to get some scientists up and running … it would take a long time to reestablish from scratch.”
Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) faulted Trump for his glowing assessment of the mission before the planes had even returned.
“The way this should work is the president and the secretary of Defense should have waited until they had an assessment in their hands, and then figure out what they want to share publicly about that assessment. That’s not what happened in this case,” Kelly said.
“The president said something, the secretary of Defense repeated it, before they had anything from the [Defense Intelligence Agency]. I think that’s pretty clear to people. I mean, he basically made his own assessment based on very limited information. … The airplanes weren’t even back in Missouri by the time he’s doing his own personal [battle damage assessment].”
Welcome to The Hill’s Defense & National Security newsletter, I’m Ellen Mitchell — your guide to the latest developments at the Pentagon, on Capitol Hill and beyond.
Democratic political strategist David Axelrod said the drama over the U.S.’s recent strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities and the intel surrounding the outcome has been driven by President Trump’s “unquenchable thirst for credit.” “The controversy over the facts around the Iran attack stems from the @POTUS’s unquenchable thirst for credit and praise that leads him to overclaim,” Axelrod said Thursday in a thread on the …
Former CIA Director Leon Panetta described President Trump’s recent remarks doubting the intelligence community while launching military action against Iran as “very scary” Thursday. “It undermines the work of our intelligence professionals who really are focused on trying to provide the president with the truth — when the president questions their credibility, that certainly undermines their morale, …
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Thursday called a rare Pentagon press conference to defend the U.S. strikes on Iran and lambast the media’s coverage of the effectiveness of the operation. Hegseth criticized “fawning coverage” of early intelligence findings of the impact of Saturday’s bombing of three Iranian nuclear facilities — which suggested the strikes did not fully take out Tehran’s nuclear program and only set it back …
Supporters of the MAGA movement are more likely than traditional Republicans to back the U.S. airstrikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, according to a new poll from NBC News Decision Desk and powered by SurveyMonkey. In the survey, conducted in the days after the U.S. bombed Iran, Republicans indicate broad support for the strikes — with 78 percent supporting the military intervention, including 60 percent who strongly support …
The House is scheduled to be separately briefed tomorrow morning on the U.S. military’s recent strikes on Iran by CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Dan Caine, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
In Other News
Branch out with a different read from The Hill:
Senators diverge sharply on damage done by Iran strikes after classified briefing
WASHINGTON (AP) — Senators emerged from a classified briefing Thursday with sharply diverging assessments of President Donald Trump’s bombing of three Iranian nuclear sites, with Republicans calling the mission a clear success and Democrats expressing deep skepticism. CIA Director John Ratcliffe, …
The National Institute for Deterrence Studies will host a seminar on “Growing Concerns of Missile Threats in the Middle East,” at 8 a.m.
The Center for Strategic and International Studieswill have a discussion on “The role of landpower in the Indo-Pacific,” with U.S. Army Pacific Commanding Gen. Ronald Clark, at 11 a.m. TK
What We’re Reading
News we’ve flagged from other outlets:
Pentagon to request $848 billion in delayed base budget release (Military Times)
As military helps more with law enforcement, Senate Democrat’s proposal seeks guardrails (Military.com)
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth attacked Jennifer Griffin, his former colleague at Fox News and a longtime member of the Pentagon press corps, amid … Read more
Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R) on Thursday called for Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) to fire Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough “ASAP,” … Read more
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