President Donald Trump’s weekend attacks on Iran tore schisms among the elite of MAGA — but the repercussions have also shaken his base.
While Trump allies such as Marjorie Taylor Greene and Steve Bannon have been vehemently opposed to the attacks, it was considered that everyday people who "get on board."
But in interviews with six Trump supporters across the country, the New York Times found simmering anxieties about their president’s actions — with most wondering how they lined up with his campaign promises to keep the U.S. out of long wars.
For some, the Iranian attacks smashed their trust.
“One of the big reasons I voted for him was him keeping us out of stuff in the Middle East,” ex-Marine Charles Vaughers said from his home in Wyoming.
And he said the latest bombing was a “step too far.”
“We’ve definitely had our trust shaken,” he added, saying his opinion was shared by others in the ruby red state.
Tempted by Trump’s America First platform, Vaughers voted for Trump in two elections.
Seeing him turn around and bomb another country was “hypocritical,” he said — and threatened “absolutely disastrous” counterattacks. He added that Trump needed to tell Israel, “OK, we’ve done the strike for you. Now, Israel, we are totally out of this.
“Figure it out on your own.”
“It’s upsetting,” another Trump voter, Noel Estrada in Colorado, told the Times.
“We voted for him because he would stay out.”
His message was shared by most of the people the Times interviewed. Trump was elected to get prices down, deal with immigration and put America’s interests first, they said.
“The bombing, he said, represented a broken promise from a politician who ran on opposing America’s involvement in ‘stupid wars.’”
“There’s no need for war,” he said. “He said he was a friendly president and didn’t want wars. And here we are, six months in.”
