A CNN fact-checker smacked down President Donald Trump's Iran claims one by one on Monday, warning that even the president's most basic claims cannot be trusted.
Daniel Dale's analysis documented a pattern of frequent false, dubious and unverifiable claims about the war. The most recent came Monday morning, when Trump told the New York Post that JD Vance was already on his way to Pakistan for Iran negotiations - only for Vance's motorcade to be spotted at the White House. He wasn't leaving until Tuesday.
"Trump’s inaccurate remark might be shrugged off, the kind of little thing a busy president could understandably get wrong. But it’s part of a pattern that has accelerated over the past week – of this president being incorrect about even the most basic of matters related to the Iran war," wrote Dale.
On Friday, Trump declared the "Hormuz Strait situation is over" and that Iran had agreed to never close it again. Iran closed the strait the next day.
"But the situation very clearly wasn’t over: Trump himself had posted the same morning that the US would continue its blockade on ships heading to or from Iranian ports; Araghchi had said its opening of the strait only applied to a specific Iran-approved path near its coastline rather than the lanes ships had generally used before; and an Iranian official posted later in the day that ships had to get approval from the navy of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and pay tolls," wrote Dale.
Additionally, Trump told reporters the Pope had said Iran could have a nuclear weapon when the Pope said no such thing.
The crescendo came last week when Trump told journalists Iran had agreed to an unlimited moratorium on nuclear activities, cut off all support for Hamas and Hezbollah, and surrendered its enriched uranium stockpile. Asked point-blank for confirmation, Trump replied: "They've agreed to everything."
Iran's foreign ministry responded that its enriched uranium "will not be transferred anywhere under any circumstances."
A former national security official quoted by Dale put it bluntly.
“One of the big differences between the current round of US-Iran diplomacy and prior rounds is that this administration and the President in particular are unreliable narrators,” Eric Brewer, a former National Security Council counterproliferation official, posted on social media on Friday. “Iran watchers have gotten pretty good at parsing statements from both sides over the years, but we’ve never had to contend with a US president that is so outspoken and prone to exaggeration, fabrication, and outright lies.”