Trump calls Iran War 'small potatoes'

Brian Lehrer (0:05)

From WNYC Studios, I'm Brian Lehrer. This is my Daily Politics Podcast. It's Tuesday, September 8th.

They say Labor Day begins the sprint to the November elections every year. And so it is. Here we are in 2026, right, in the battle for control of Congress. Almost all the primaries already in the books. Election Day is eight weeks from today.

Early voting begins weeks before that. Mail-in voting as well, which may or may not be disrupted to any degree by the Trump Executive Order to the Postal Service. That's playing out in the courts. And you probably missed this even on Labor Day weekend, Sunday to be precise. The Trump administration filed a request with the Supreme Court to let its restrictive mail-in ballot rules take effect.

Jonathan Lemire from The Atlantic has an article called The Real Reason Trump Wants Economic Sanctions in Iran. The Real Reason Trump Wants Economic Sanctions in Iran. And yes, Jonathan has a specific midterms theory for that, which he will share with us in just a second. Here's a clue to what that is. Trump telling a reporter on Friday that he doesn't even call it a war. He calls it small potatoes.

Donald Trump (1:21)

Well, I'll tell you what, a lot of people don't call it a war. They call it a military conflict because it's small potatoes for us. It's not a big thing. We did Venezuela and we did this. In Venezuela we lost nobody, in this we lost 18 people. And in Vietnam you lost 100,000 people, and in other conflicts you lost tens of thousands of people.

I would say that it's intermittent. We do intermittent strikes.

Brian Lehrer (1:49)

Trump on Friday.

So let's start there with Jonathan Lemire, staff writer for The Atlantic, co-host of Morning Joe on Msnow, and author of the book about another recent election that I'm sure even he hopes doesn't offer the chance for a sequel. The book, The Big Lie, Election Chaos, Political Opportunism, and The State of American Politics after 2020 Jonathan, for you as a sports fan, I'll say happy opening day to the final innings, the fourth quarter, the deciding set, pick your sports metaphor, and thanks for helping to kick it off or tip it off with us.

Jonathan Lemire (2:24)

Well done. Well done. I'm always happy to be here. You were right, pick your sport. But this is this retort.

This is when traditionally Americans start paying attention to an election. We know, of course, some of these campaigns have hoped that their opinions have been baked in long ago. But this is two months. And certainly, as you say, Brian, the war on Iran looms large.

Brian Lehrer (2:51)

The article, your most recent article, unless you dropped another one in the last hour and a half or so, is called The Real Reason Trump Wants Economic Sanctions in Iran. Okay, Jonathan, please reveal what you think that real reason is.

Jonathan Lemire (3:06)

Well, first, let's talk about the stated reason, which is to bring Iran to the negotiating table in a real way. And there's some validity to this. We know that the military strikes have not worked. We know that Trump, when he blusters and threatens more kinetic attacks, Iran has learned to call those bluffs. And yes, there has been exchange, there have been some days of possibilities, relatively low-level stuff in recent weeks. So, if war is not working and the negotiations long ago broke down and frankly most observers believe that Iran got the better of that MOU, that Maran of Understanding that was signed a couple of months ago, that leaves the US with one card left to play and that is economic sanctions, trying to really ramp up pressure on Iran by, at least in theory, also targeting the countries that still do business with Iran. Now, we'll see if there's a real follow-through there with Russia, China, North Korea, but that's the idea, is to just squeeze their economy and we should note there are signs that Tehran's economy is hurting, though it's unclear how much the hardliners in power really care if their people are suffering. So, that's the stated reason, but there's another reason. An economic pressure campaign takes a long time and it takes a long time and it's a quiet process and the hope here is, from the political arm of the Trump administration, from those in the West Wing who are indeed nervous about Republicans' chances in the midterms this fall, they hope that the war will slip from the headlines and it will no longer be the A story on your show or mine and that Americans, because they know it's so damaging to Republicans' chances. Now, this is hardly a foolproof plan because if gas prices stay high, well, Americans are going to take note of that, but it goes to show that they're sort of out of good options here, Republicans, this fall, but they hope that if they can downplay the war, and we hear Trump do it all the time, that the voters at least won't be thinking about it as their first concern as they go into the ballot box.