Trump's War on Iran: The MAGA Betrayal? – Iran War Daily Briefing #4 | Counterfire
Trump campaigned with a mantra of ‘no more forever wars’, emphasising his commitment to stimulating industry and national pride domestically.
Trump campaigned with a mantra of ‘no more forever wars’, emphasising his commitment to stimulating industry and national pride domestically. His war on Iran has not only plunged the Middle East into chaos but has also ruptured his supporters’ faith in his commitment to America First. Chris Bambery gives an overview
‘This is insane. Regime change will result in a bloody civil war, killing hundreds of thousands and creating another massive Muslim refugee crisis. Topping a leader is NEVER as easy as you think. It almost always results in further involvement, a civil war, and chaos. Resist this!’
Those were the words of the American right-wing commentator Charlie Kirk, spoken last summer, just months before his death. He was responding to neo-conservative Republican Senator Lindsey Graham’s call for regime change in Iran.
You might recall Tommy Robinson and his ‘stop the boats’ brigade voicing their support for Kirk on last year’s ‘Unite the Kingdom’ march. Almost immediately, it transpired that Kirk had broken with his Zionist backers by criticising the Gaza genocide and that many of his supporters were on social media claiming Israel was responsible for his killing. Tommy Robinson has stayed silent on the matter.
Kirk was one of many right wing commentators who had supported Trump, believing his promise that he would end ‘forever wars’ and regime change policies. Instead, resources would be re-directed to Make America Great Again (Maga), bringing industry and jobs back to the US.
Trump stood in the 2024 presidential election as the ‘candidate for peace.’ He told one rally: ‘I can tell you, you’re not gonna have a war with me.’ In November 2024 during his election night victory speech, Trump told his supporters ‘I’m not going to start a war. I’m going to stop wars.’
Two months later, in his inaugural address, he stated that ‘We will measure our success not only by the battles we win but also by the wars that we end – and perhaps most importantly, the wars we never get into.’ His attacks on President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamal Harris and their Democratic predecessors Obama and Clinton were hugely popular. He critiqued their neo-conservative policy of constant war and regime change.
Vice President JD Vance published an op-ed in Vanity Fair in 2023 declaring ‘Trump’s best foreign policy? Not starting any wars” and told an interviewer in the following year that Harris was “sleepwalking into war with Iran.’
Tucker Carlson is one of the most influential right commentators in the US. He was a high profile campaigner for Trump across all three of his presidential bids. Last week he met with Trump in the Oval Office where he reportedly urged the president against striking Iran. Carslon has described the war on Iran as ‘absolutely disgusting and evil’, while adding that ‘this is going to shuffle the deck in a profound way.’ With the mid-term elections looming, that should be taken as a warning to Trump and the Republicans.
Curt Mills, the executive director of The American Conservative magazine, has described Trump’s rule as an ‘imperial presidency.’ In an interview with Vanity Fair, he said Trump’s ‘core appeal’ in the 2024 campaign was an anti-globalist, anti-imperial message. In response to the attack on Iran he stated: ‘Now it just seems overt. The administration serves rich people and does wars for foreign countries. It plays so ruthlessly into the Democrats’ oligarchy messaging… It seems served up on a fucking platter. It’s a two-to-one unpopular war, and it’s weirdly associated with the administration’s potential corruption.’ An obvious nod to the Epstein scandal.
Many of Trump’s former supporters have accused him of a cover up, suggesting that war on Iran is about distracting attention away from the Epstein case.
Former Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene resigned earlier this year over Trump and the files. Like Carlson, she also criticised his unconditional support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza. In response to the attack on Iran she issued a statement denouncing the president, claiming he is betraying voters who supported him for ending foreign wars.
Greene seethed that ‘thousands and thousands of Americans from my generation have been killed and injured in never ending pointless foreign wars and we said no more. But we are freeing the Iranian people. Please.’ In another post, she called the administration a ‘bunch of sick fucking liars’ who had campaigned for ‘zero wars’.
Jack Posobiec, a far right-wing commentator and influencer, posted on X pointing to a warning last year from the late Charlie Kirk before he was assassinated in September:
‘Charlie Kirk told us all that the younger generation of Americans are far more interested in domestic policy than pursuing international conflicts and we can’t forget that in a midterm year.’
Polls taken before the first attacks on Iran showed limited public appetite for another war.
A POLITICO survey conducted in February 2026 found that just half of Trump’s 2024 voters supported military action, while 30 percent opposed it. Those fractures, combined with largely unified opposition from Democrats, meant Americans broadly did not want an attack on Iran.
Trump received increased support from young men in 2024, but recent opinion polls indicate that even this is waning. Public opinion polls consistently show Americans’ top concern is the rising cost of living. Much of Trump’s first 13 months in office, however, has been dominated by foreign policy issues. Before the war on Iran, Trump bombed Yemen, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, Somalia and Venezuela, as well as giving Netanyahu his complete support in Gaza.
Many in the Maga base began to attack this policy, asserting that Trump’s behaviour seems more in line with “Make Israel Great Again.” Last month, a poll found that 47 percent of Americans believed the U.S. government is too focused on international issues over domestic ones, while roughly one-quarter thought it is striking the right balance. Forty one percent of Trump’s 2024 voters said the U.S. government is too focused on international issues.
Trump’s gamble is that this will be a quick war, avoiding heavy US casualties. He genuinely seems to believe that the Iranian regime is on the verge of collapse and that one push will achieve this. Michigan-based Republican strategist Jason Roe told POLITICO: ‘The political risk depends on the outcome. If we break Iran without terrorist attacks coming to America or harm coming to allies in the region, it will be a political win for Trump. … If this expands into a protracted conflict, or ends up with troops on the ground, it will be a liability.’
A poll taken over the weekend shows only one in four Americans approve of the U.S. strikes on Iran that have plunged the Middle East into chaos, while about half — including one in four Republicans — believe President Donald Trump is too willing to use military force.
Some 27 percent of respondents said they approved of the strikes the US conducted alongside Israeli attacks on Iran, while 43 percent disapproved and 29 percent were not sure. Forty two percent of Republicans said they would be less likely to support the Iran campaign if it leads to U.S. troops in the Middle East being killed or injured.
Some 45 percent of poll respondents, including 34 percent of Republicans and forty four percent of independents, said they would be less likely to support the campaign against Iran if petrol (gas) or oil prices increased in the United States.
These figures stand in stark contrast to August 1965, when 61 percent of Americans did not believe it was a mistake to send US troops into Vietnam. [1] Compare and contrast!
[1] William L. Lunch and Peter W. Sperlich, American Public Opinion and the War in Vietnam, The Western Political Quarterly, March 1979, Vol. 32, no.1 (p25)
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