Trump ties Iran war to midterm losses, says he will work with Democrats

Update, 4 November, 09:07 Israel time

Further remarks from the same night of post-election interviews have emerged, with Trump saying he will work with Democrats and leaving open further action on Iran. Abu Ali Express reported that Trump told Fox News he has the right to veto anything, but does not want to spend the next two years doing nothing but vetoing, and that Democrats had already called his team. The channel also said he posted an image of a red veto hat as the results came in.

According to Abu Ali Express, Trump said he was completely convinced his Iran decision was the right one for the country's long-term good, calling voters' unwillingness to bear higher fuel costs a great pity.

Asked by Fox News whether he now intends to escalate the campaign against Iran, Trump replied that his administration would assess the situation and act if it saw an opportunity, Abu Ali Express reported. The same report quoted him telling CBS that the war will end when he says it ends.

Israel Hayom reported that Trump also spoke to The New York Times, saying he was prepared to accept the results, blaming the losses on his absence from the ballot and defending his decision to strike Iran. The paper described the mood at the White House as dark and funereal as aides watched the returns with him.

The Jerusalem Post reported that Trump congratulated Democrats on their success and faulted Republican candidates for the party's performance.

The story as first reported

US President Donald Trump has said the war with Iran was one of the reasons Republicans lost ground in Tuesday's midterm elections, arguing that voters backed his Iran policy but balked at the rise in gasoline prices that came with it. Speaking to Fox News, Trump said people agreed with his approach to Iran but were probably not prepared to accept the short-term cost at the pump, The Times of Israel reported. He added that he understood that view but did not share it, and that on Iran "we have to do something large."

Trump also said the scale of the defeat caught him off guard. "I thought they'd do better," he said, pointing to large crowds at his rallies. According to Ynet, he said he would cooperate with Democrats but would use his veto if they "do crazy things." Ynet also noted a shift in his message: in the closing weeks of the campaign he repeatedly told supporters he was on the ballot, while after the results he said he had not been, and that Republicans would have won had he been running himself.

What the midterm elections are

Midterm elections in the United States take place halfway through a president's four-year term. Every seat in the House of Representatives and a portion of the Senate are contested, along with many state offices. The president's own name does not appear on the ballot, which is the point Trump returned to after the results. Midterms are widely read as a verdict on the sitting president, and the party holding the White House often loses seats.

Haaretz, carrying a Reuters report, said Democrats were preparing to take control of both the House and the Senate and to challenge the president's legislative programme. Control of both chambers would allow Democrats to set the agenda in Congress, decide which bills come to a vote and run congressional investigations.

Why a veto matters now

A presidential veto allows the president to reject a bill passed by Congress. Congress can override it only with a two-thirds majority in each chamber, a high threshold that usually requires support from members of the president's own party. With Democrats in charge of Congress, the veto becomes Trump's main tool for blocking legislation he opposes, which is the context for his pledge to Ynet's reporters and other outlets that he would reject Democratic measures he considered extreme.

Iran, fuel and the economy

Trump's argument centres on gasoline. N12, the Israeli television news channel, quoted him telling Fox News that the US has the best economy in the world but that high fuel prices kept the public from seeing it as clearly as it otherwise would, and that those prices had been caused by Iran. Fuel costs are among the most visible prices for American households and have long been a factor in how voters judge the economy.

The interview also touched on whether he had second thoughts about the conflict itself. N12's foreign desk, citing The Wall Street Journal, reported that Trump acknowledged the war's role in the losses while saying he did not regret launching it.

For Israeli readers and observers abroad, the remarks carry particular interest because US policy on Iran directly affects Israel's security. Haaretz filed the report under its coverage of both Iran and US relations and Israel and US relations. The reports do not describe what Trump meant by doing "something large" on Iran.

How the coverage differs

The outlets agree on the core of what Trump said but frame it differently. The Times of Israel and Haaretz described the remarks as an admission that the war played a role. Ynet and N12, both Hebrew-language outlets, presented the comments as excuses for the defeat, with N12's correspondent placing Iran in what he called Trump's parade of excuses. The wording of the gasoline quote also varies slightly between the Times of Israel's article text and a video clip embedded in the same report, though the meaning is the same.

The Times of Israel noted that Trump had held a campaign rally at Salina Regional Airport in Kansas on November 1, days before the vote.

What the reports do not say

None of the reports give final seat counts or confirm the final makeup of either chamber; Haaretz describes Democrats as preparing to take control rather than having formally done so. No Democratic response to Trump's veto pledge has been reported, and Trump did not specify which initiatives he would block or what new step on Iran he had in mind.