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June 19, 2025 - Sean Hannity Show
29:26
Sen. Graham: Defending Our Allies - June 18th, Hour 1
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All right.
Thank you, Scott Shannon.
And thanks to all of you for being with us.
Write down our toll-free telephone number if you want to be a part of the program.
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I know a lot of people are kind of obsessed with this Karen Reed case and the retrial and the death of a Boston police officer, John O'Keefe.
And she was found not guilty of second-degree murder, not guilty of manslaughter.
And I believe the only thing she might have been found guilty of what is a DUI.
I'm not sure if we have, well, that's actually my.
Another thing that she was guilty of was driving under the influence.
She was not found guilty on either of the murder charges.
Yeah, so, I mean, there's been, I don't know why people get so interested in these crime cases, but I have friends of mine that are just absolutely positively obsessed with all of this.
Let me deal with an issue that has come up.
We pointed out yesterday, Matt Towery, Robert Cahaley, they polled Donald Trump the best.
There's nobody even close.
And they did a poll, a joint poll that came out.
And the question was, what is your opinion of President Trump's position that Iran be prevented from developing a nuclear weapon by any means necessary?
Very, very pointed question.
74.4% say they approve.
Fake news, CNN, staggering numbers.
83% of Republicans, 79% of Democrats, 79% of Independents, 79% of all adults oppose Iran obtaining nuclear weapons.
We talked yesterday about the Havid Harris poll, 85% saying Tehran should never get a bomb.
I mean, there's nearly full agreement here.
Now, with some amusement, I mean, people have been trying to drag me into what, you know, I think the media is overhyping as this MAGA conservative outright war.
Well, if it is, and my name keeps getting mentioned, I'm not a part of it and barely paying attention to it.
I really don't care that other people have different points of view than I do.
If you're asking me what my opinion is, I give you my opinion.
I actually support the Trump doctrine on this.
Donald Trump did everything humanly possible to get the Iranians to have peace.
He understands the existential threat that they represent, number one state sponsor of terror.
We do support our ally, Israel, which I believe is the right policy decision.
And somehow this has evolved into this is not MAGA.
Well, Donald Trump is MAGA.
And people, I guess the memories are short.
Not really sure why, but this is the same Donald Trump that defeated the ISIS Caliphate.
I know maybe a lot of people weren't paying attention to it, but I mean, he wiped them out and he did it in record time.
And he did it without one boot on the ground to do it or accomplish it.
He's the same guy that took out Baghdadi and associates.
Again, no boots on the ground, no long-term protracted conflict in the Middle East.
He took out Soleimani, you know, the leader of terrorism for Iran for a long, long time.
And yeah, every single solitary military effort has risk.
We have got to be very sober when we're talking about anything involving innocent Americans.
And then you have to calculate.
You basically do risk management calculation and you have to make tough decisions.
And that's what the president, I think, is rightly done.
And I think the president is 100% right.
He's given them every opportunity.
And now it looks like, you know, the president's demand for unconditional surrender is not going to be met.
And there is now a moment of truth for the president.
If you ask me, probably a week from now, the Iranian nuclear program is going to be gone.
I mean, the inner circle of the supreme leader has been hollowed out.
And thanks to, you know, Israel and their strength, it should be.
I mean, how many hundreds of thousands of rockets should any one country take, all fomented by this sick, ugly, twisted convert or die radical regime that believes in a mass holocaust and wiping Israel off the map and wiping the U.S. off the map?
And so anyway, Ayatollah, all his friends have pretty much been knocked out as senior military officials, his biggest scientists, his top military commander who took his post four days ago because his predecessor was also killed in an airstrike by Israel.
And Iran's ballistic missile salvos are getting smaller.
Clearly, their stockpiles are low.
The launchers have been also taken out by the Israelis.
And we do have a window of opportunity here to rid the world of any potential threat of Iranians and their radicalism having weapons of mass destruction.
Now, if you ask me what the Trump doctrine is, I think I sum it up pretty well, and that is that the president will go after these bad actors preemptively in defense of the United States, like he did the Caliphate, ISIS, like he did Baghdadi and associates, like he did Soleimani, and like it appears he's ready to do with Iran.
That, to me, is in keeping with his past history to the T, to the letter.
The president also is against extended, protracted conflicts abroad and decades-long wars.
But, you know, we've been trying to educate people for a long time now about the next generation of weaponry.
And my prediction that future wars are never going to be fought in the battlefield like they were in the past, and that technology is going to advance even that more quickly with the use of artificial intelligence.
And we better be ahead of the rest of the world because it's a dangerous place with a lot of dangerous evil actors in it.
And so do I know for sure what the president's going to do?
No.
Do I have a pretty good idea of where this is headed?
I do because, you know, look at what the president of the United States can go on social media and tell everyone in Tehran to evacuate.
And you have millions of people on their way out of Iran's capital city, and the cars are barely moving, and they appear to be listening to the president.
And the mullahs of Iran, unfortunately, weren't listening.
Iran should have signed the deal.
I told them to sign.
It's a shame, a waste of human life.
Simply stated, Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon.
That would be the Trump doctrine.
Also, how often does Donald Trump talk about the MA movement being common sense?
It's common sense when people say that they want to wipe you off the face of the earth, that they mean what they say.
And Iran means what it says.
And the Trump doctrine is clear.
They can't have weapons of mass destruction.
They can't.
And, you know, they fired hundreds of thousands of weapons provided to their proxies all in this sick war against Israel.
And if you really think about it, the president's been saying the exact words.
We went back in time.
We found President Trump, then a private citizen Trump, saying that Iran can't have a nuclear weapon all throughout the year, starting back in 2011.
And the American people overwhelmingly agree with this.
And to me, it's basic, simple common sense.
Now, there might be some people that are completely risk averse.
And I ask what happens if they ever get those weapons of mass destruction.
I would argue that you risk a modern-day Holocaust and that you risk one day as their ballistic missile capability inevitably, if you don't stop them, would advance, that they might be able to hit the continental United States.
So, where this appears to be headed, New York Post had a front page headline today, mullah this over.
And President Trump to Iran, surrender or face bunker buster bombs.
You know, and then he even said that he knew where the supreme leader was, but we're letting him live for now.
And, you know, we'll see what we'll see how this unfolds, but I think it is inevitable.
I wouldn't be surprised by next week if they don't have a weapon of mass destruction and they don't have a nuclear program.
And it's going to take, look, once you own the skies of a country which they really own, and the Israelis have successfully, you know, did this.
We have one main nuclear facility.
The Israelis took out the other two.
It's the Fordeau facility outside of Tehran, and it's 300 feet inside of a mountain.
It could only be delivered with these bunker, 30,000-pound bunker buster bombs.
It may take, according to military experts I've been talking to, it may take as many as four of them to finish the job.
And when you own the skies, you can pretty safely go there.
Now, from my perspective, is this is not a forever war.
Now, the president will have to protect our interest in the region.
I think everybody will need to be on high alert.
There's no military action that is ever without risk.
I do not want to minimize that in any way, shape, manner, or form.
We have a lot of assets in the region, and desperate people are capable of desperate things.
And we've got to be ever vigilant, and we've got to protect every man, woman in and around surrounding areas that may be targets.
However, to do nothing and to watch the same regime that has been fomenting terror in the region is to me a policy of just utter madness.
It really is.
By the way, approximately 700,000 Americans are living in Israel at any one given time.
I don't know how many people know that.
That's a lot of people that are living there.
You know, I've gone through this.
I've gone through the polling.
I've gone over the arguments.
And I don't know how in some people's minds that this has evolved into the MA movement means isolationism.
It does not.
That has not been the history.
The Ford enrichment plan is buried deep under this mountain.
It's south of Tehran.
It is believed to be the most significant secretive nuclear facility inside of Iran.
While their missile defenses are down, if you're ever going to do it and eliminate the threat of this radical regime having weapons that could wipe out millions of people, now would be the time to do it.
And I, you know, Israel does not have the critical weapon in their arsenal to pull this off, and that will be President Trump's decision to make.
All these people that think that they can sway President Trump, I've known him too long.
You can make your case, but ultimately he decides.
And he has said they can never have the nuclear weapon, and I believe him.
And he would deliver the final blow to that in all likelihood.
Now, that would end the threat of nuclear terror once and for all.
Not an easy decision.
Not without, as I said, risks.
Do the people of Israel and the rest of the region deserve to live in peace without the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran with the lunatics that run this, that have run this country and terrorized the entire region for how many years now?
You know, there's an argument to be made.
You want to talk about a forever war?
Well, there's been a kind of forever war being waged against the United States by the Iranians.
Nobody ever talks about that part.
And you could take it back to Ayatollah Khomeini, 1979, and the taking of U.S. hostages.
And, you know, they've been given a final warning.
They want a full, complete, unconditional surrender.
That's what Donald Trump has said.
If they want to avoid what is now becoming inevitable, that's what it would take.
But the Iran hostage crisis from November to January, November 79 to January 1981 and held hostage, what was it, 444 days?
The Beirut embassy bombing.
What did the 9-11 Commission report say?
They were at war with us.
We weren't at war with them.
Yeah, well, that bombing in Beirut in 1983 by Hezbollah, Iranian-backed, and then the Beirut Marine Barracks bombing, that killed 241 Marines under Reagan's term.
The U.S. Embassy annex building in Beirut, that killed 24.
We can keep going.
Kidnapping of U.S. citizens in Lebanon.
The Kobar Towers bombing in 96, that was in Saudi Arabia.
Again, Hezbollah.
You know, then we have arms and training to insurgents in Iraq targeting Americans during that conflict.
And the same in Afghanistan, Taliban fighters.
You know, all of the unrest in the region has one main common denominator, and that's Iran.
And do I think America's goal should be a forever war?
No.
But in Iran's forever war against us, the regime has targeted and killed Americans worldwide.
And they're preparing for missiles and retaliatory strikes.
We've got to plan for worst case scenario that they're going to target Americans.
Well, Hannity, they might come to America and they commit acts of terror.
Well, you can thank Joe Biden because they're already here.
I can't believe the level of ignorance of some people, Democrats in particular, they're so stupid.
Amazing thing is that Iran has launched dozens of attacks on U.S. targets that have killed, Tom Cotton said this, thousands of Americans.
Why people don't listen to others that say, you know, when people say death to Israel, death to America, why you don't take that seriously?
I don't know why some people don't take that seriously.
If you want to talk about a forever war, they've been waging it against us, certainly against Israel.
And they've been given every opportunity for peace, but they can't have a nuclear weapon.
And if you don't see the wisdom in that, I'm not going to try and convince you.
You're entitled to your own opinion.
But only the U.S. military is going to be able to take out their most dangerous nuclear site.
That's just a fact.
And that's the Fordeau fuel enrichment plant just outside of Tehran.
Again, we own the skies.
It makes it less risky.
Probably the most ideal time ever if you're going to try to pull this off is now, which would be the first time since 1979 that we can neutralize what is the number one state sponsor of terror.
And I don't really care what other people think.
You know, the idea that people, you know, that somehow People have somehow want to identify the president's MA movement as isolation is bizarre to me.
Sole Amani, you know, Baghdadian associates, the ISIS Caliphate.
Not exactly isolationism.
Now, we have gone over the numbers.
They are overwhelming.
And that is, you know, if you look at even fake news, CNN, you got 79% of Democrats, 79% of Independents, 83% of Republicans, 79% of all adults are saying the same thing.
And that is they oppose Iran obtaining nuclear weapons.
I think the definitive poll by Robert Cahali of Trafalgar and an insider advantage head, Matt Towery, they did a joint poll, and the question was very pointed.
What is your opinion of President Trump's position that Iran must be prevented from developing a nuclear weapon by any means necessary?
74.4% said that they approve and agree with that.
And we can go on to the Havid Harris poll.
85%, yeah, Tehran must never, ever get the bomb.
Now, Israel has taken out two of the three sites.
There's one site remaining, and it seems that that site, the Bordeaux site that we keep talking about, would need American assistance to make this happen.
And hence the decision that the president will have to make.
And I have every confidence that the president understands.
He's been saying since 2011 that Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon.
One of the more bizarre conversations to arise out of this is, well, this is against MAGA.
Donald Trump is against forever wars.
You're right.
So am I. I'm against forever wars.
And with military technology, I don't think they're ever going to be fought the same way again.
But it's the same Donald Trump that took out Sole Amani on the tarmac.
And that was done.
And all the predictions of doom and gloom and retribution.
Any military effort has risk associated with it.
But then you have to factor in the risk of a nuclear-armed Iran, the number one state sponsor of terror that has fired hundreds of thousands of missiles.
They're firing them right now into Jerusalem as we speak.
They've been firing into heavily civilian areas, populated civilian areas like Tel Aviv, and they have sworn to wipe Israel off the map and the United States off the map.
They have made these threats repeatedly.
But it's also the same Donald Trump that wiped out the Caliphate, the same Donald Trump that took out Baghdadian associates.
I'm not sure how some are saying that the MA movement is an isolationist movement, which means no involvement at all.
It's not.
It is in no way contradictory to say that this one remaining site needs to be taken out.
And if it's the United States at a time when their air defense systems are down, it's the safest it's ever going to be.
But there's always risk with any military operation.
And take it out and forever end the threat of Iranian mullahs married to their sick converter ideology and forever remove that threat of a modern-day Holocaust to me is basic, simple common sense.
Yeah, that also would be part of the Trump doctrine.
And Donald Trump is, it's not inconsistent if you take out those sites the way you took out Sole Amani, Baghdadi, and associates, and also the ISIS Caliphate, and not have a forever war.
Nobody wants that.
I definitely don't.
Anyway, Senator Lindsey Graham, South Carolina, is with us.
Senator, how are you?
Good.
Thanks a bunch for having me.
Let's get your take on all of this.
To me, it's a window of opportunity.
Their air defenses are down.
The president has been clear what his policy is.
They can't have a nuclear weapon.
He's been saying it since 2011 and hundreds of times since.
It seems like the moment is here.
Yeah, the forever war started in 1979 when the Ayatollah replaced the Shah.
They held our embassy personnel hostage.
Since 1979, Iran has been waging war through Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houdis against Israel.
They have American blood on their hands.
So that's the war I'd like to end.
And if you don't believe Iran would use a nuclear weapon to destroy Israel, you're not listening to what they're saying.
If you don't believe they would use a nuclear weapon to come after us, the infidel, you're not listening to what they say.
November the 4th in Iran is commonly referred to as Death to America Day.
In 1987, they made that a holiday.
That was the day they took over our embassy.
We have a military for a reason, to protect our way of life, protect our homeland, and protect our allies.
You know, when my dad was drafted in World War II, the term was called the duration.
We were going to fight until we beat the Nazis, took Berlin, and took Tokyo, and we did.
In this war, we're not going to have ground troops, and it won't last forever because we have the capability to destroy the Iranian nuclear program, working with Israel fairly quickly.
We're down to one site, deep underground, about a half a mile under the ground.
We have technology and bombs and capability.
Israel doesn't.
It is my advice to President Trump, help Israel finish the job, go all in to destroy the last nuclear site.
If we take this program on and we don't finish it, it will be a disaster.
So let's finish the job.
I agree with you, and I actually think that the Israelis have done a spectacular job on their own.
Now, we have to factor in that Iran and Iran through their proxies, and I've been to Israel a number of times, as you have been there many, many times, many, many times more than me.
I mean, I went to one border town with Gaza at the time, and I think 2015 had been hit with 10,000 rockets in 10 years.
They have withstood Houthi rebel rockets, Hezbollah rockets, Islamic Jihad rockets, Hamas rockets, Quds forces, Iranian Revolutionary Guards forces, helped develop the October 7th attack against Israel.
They provided the weaponry for that.
They've been fomenting terror not just in the region, but around the world.
There's not a single country that wants to come to Iran's defense.
And we now find ourselves with a window of opportunity to forever remove any possibility they'd have this weapon of mass destruction married to their ideology.
Now, how is that any different than taking out Soleimani, Al-Baghdadi, and associates, or beating the Caliphate?
I don't see that as inconsistent at all.
Well, I think the, yeah, you're dead right.
The primary job of being commander-in-chief president of the United States is to protect us, our homeland, from existential threats and to protect our allies.
And we have no better allies in the state of Israel.
Iran has 900 pounds of highly enriched uranium that could make about a dozen bombs if they went to the last mile.
They're at 60%.
To get to 90% is weeks, not years.
They have one civilian reactor.
They haven't used any of the enriched uranium to run that reactor.
They get their fuel from Russia.
So this is weapon-grade material in large quantity.
They've been doing this for decades, and their goal is to develop a nuclear weapons force to use as part of their ideology.
I don't think Rocketman is going to attack America.
I don't believe Putin's ambition is to destroy Israel, destroy the United States.
Nor do I believe that about China.
I think they're mercantile.
I think they're an adversary.
But I believe this regime is founded on a religious ideology that makes them religious Nazis.
They're being told by their version of Islam to destroy the Jewish state, to drive out the infidels and to purify Islam.
They're not elected.
It's a theocracy.
They mean what they say.
Four presidents have said Iran can't have a nuclear weapon.
It will be Donald J. Trump who makes that a reality, period.
All we need to do is help Israel finish the last site and wait and see what happens after that.
Is that in your mind, and obviously protecting our interests in the region?
Is that basically the job that you want President Trump to accomplish?
For example, there are other targets.
I mean, most of their refineries are on this one island, and you could wipe out any ability of them in the future to make money.
The Israelis could do that on their own.
They don't need our help or assistance for that.
Certainly, they can knock out their gas-powered power grid, and the entire country will be without power.
That's another easy target because the Israelis own the sky over Iran.
So, you know, once the nuclear component is out of the way, I guess at that point, it's going to be up to Israel what they decide to do in their conflict with Iran.
And frankly, with all the weapons they've fired into Israel, I wouldn't put it past them to take it all out.
Well, so here's the question for Israel and really the world.
We can destroy their infrastructure to enrich uranium.
There's one site left.
But as long as the regime is in power, they'll rebuild it over time.
And President Trump is not going to be president forever.
So the question for the world, the largest state-sponsored terrorism is Iran under U.S. law.
They have a policy to decimate Israel and to reshape the entire faith in a way to exclude us.
Convert or die is their ideology.
Wouldn't it be great for the people of Iran and the world if this regime went away?
And people say, well, what will come next?
Here's what I'm going to tell you.
The guy in charge wants to kill all the Jews.
He wants to kill us.
They beat a young girl to death on a bus in Iran because she didn't cover her head.
I'm willing to risk it won't be any worse than that guy.
So the bottom line is, I hope and pray that the Iranian people will know freedom.
It will be up to them to take the regime down, but Israel will not tolerate living this way anymore.
The Jews in Israel are oppressed by everybody around them.
They have lived in fear.
They have lived in an oppressive environment since his founding, October the 7th.
Children were murdered.
Women raped in front of their children.
They've had it.
They should have it.
I am tired of living this way.
To our friends in Israel, do what you have to do to be safe.
And they're making us safer.
The people they're fighting want to kill us too.
And to all these people sitting in the stands, second-guessing Trump, you have no idea what you're talking about.
You would know the difference between a Sunni and a Shia than anything.
So this is a religious theocracy.
They're fanatics.
They're dedicated to killing all the Jews and coming after us.
They mean it when they say death to Israel, death to America.
So I'm hoping and praying we take their nuclear program down.
And if Israel wants to take the regime's ability to wage war down by destroying their refineries, destroying their ability to wage war, so be it.
Well, at that point, if the United States in a joint military operation helps take out this final nuclear facility, then it really comes down to the Israelis and how far they want to go.
I don't think President Trump has not expressed any desire for regime change.
He even identified that they know where the supreme leader is, but they're not going to kill him.
But he did say, and he has said consistently for now decades, that they can't have a nuclear weapon.
And that would be in the best interest of the United States.
And at that point, the Israelis, I mean, after all that Iran has done to murder and rape, and you're right on October 7th, but it's an ongoing, never-ending, you know, missile barrage funded by Iran and their proxies.
Well, so President Trump has told the Ayatollah, if you attack American bases or interest, that will be the end of you.
That will be regime change.
If they come after our forces in the region, that will be the end of the Ayatollah's.
But put yourself in Israel's shoes for a moment.
What is the right response when people lob rockets consistently at civilian populations?
They raid your country, they murder, rape children, women, they have people hostage.
What would we do if one country, if a country sent one rocket in to America?
Well, I have to go.
One rocket.
I've been making the same argument.
We would demand immediate military action.
Senator Lindsey Graham, appreciate you being with us.
It's going to be an interesting week ahead.
There's no doubt about it.
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