Sean Hannity and Steve Witkoff analyze the SAVE Act and recent "Operation Midnight Hammer" strikes against Iran, which targeted 5,000 military sites including Karg Island oil facilities after intercepting reports of 460 kilograms of 60% enriched uranium. Hannity argues President Trump's proactive doctrine neutralizes threats like ISIS, contrasting it with alleged Democratic funding for Iranian nuclear programs, while noting the Supreme Leader was wounded and seven Americans killed. The discussion concludes that preventing a nuclear-armed Iran is essential to avoid millions of casualties, with B-52 bombers now deployed to finalize the mission. [Automatically generated summary]
We've got a lot to get to in the course of the program today.
All things simple, man.
Bill O'Reilly will join us.
Mike Lee will get an update on the SAVE Act.
It will be coming to the Senate floor.
That's progress.
And I hope they keep it open on the Senate floor and we'll see what the numbers are.
And we will be following it regularly.
Last night, we had a very, very important interview with the Middle Eastern envoy, Steve Witkoff.
I've known Steve a long time.
And Steve is probably one of the most honest people you will ever meet in your life.
He's incredibly honest and very kind person.
And I don't know why he's just so well suited for the job the president gave him.
He's been working with Putin and working with the Iranians and everybody in between.
You talk about shuttle diplomacy.
I haven't even asked him how many hours he's been flying around the world, you know, here, there, and everywhere to try to bring about peace, which is a noble goal.
But, you know, the president had said over and over again, he said it before Operation Midnight Hammer.
He said it before Operation Epic Fury.
In Midnight Hammer, he gave the Iranians a 50-day deadline to make a peace deal.
And, okay, I can understand.
Maybe the Iranians, you know, having dealt with the likes of Biden and Harris and Obama and Clinton and everybody before Trump, maybe they miscalculated and didn't think Trump meant what he said.
And sure enough, 14 bunker buster bombs later, you know, the nuclear facilities are obliterated.
Doesn't mean they didn't have some enriched uranium stored away, which we always suspected and, in fact, is true.
Anyway, so leading up to Epic Fury, the same thing.
The president, like every single day, Linda, I mean, how many times we should go back and like figure out how many times the president said he prefers a peace deal.
And he invested time, energy, resources.
And while he was building up our defenses in the region in case they were unwilling to make a deal, he was sending over Steve Witkoff, Jared Kushner, for the purpose of making a deal.
Now, the reason this interview is so important, and I brought Steve on once before, but I went into way more detail with him in this interview last night because there's so many lies out there.
There's so many people with agendas out there.
You know what I figured out?
I figured out that those people that are unhappy that Donald Trump didn't go their way, those that don't understand the Trump doctrine, I don't know why people misinterpret the Trump doctrine.
I agree, no forever wars.
I agree, you know, no boots on the ground, you know, unless it's a case like Maduro and you have to get somebody.
You know, then we might have a situation where we have to make sure that the uranium that's in Iran does not end up in the wrong hands, for example.
That might be an exception, but the president is pretty firm in what he said.
So anyway, Steve Witkoff, and they sit down with the Iranians, and he explained what happened.
And he explained that behind the scenes, they felt they had an inalienable right to enrich nuclear fuel, meaning they have an inalienable right to nuclear weapons.
And obviously, Steve Witkoff was pretty funny about it.
He said, yeah, we have the inalienable right to tell you no.
And then in the course of this discussion, a number of things came out.
The Iranian negotiators proudly, maybe to scare off Steve Witcoff, President Trump, I don't know, but foolishly, you know, revealed that they had 460 kilograms of enriched uranium, which was 60% enrichment.
Now, to take 60% enriched uranium and turn it into weapons-grade uranium, 90%, that would take about a week to 10 days.
In other words, they were 10 days away.
Now, when I read in the paper and it was public, the comment by Steve Witcoff that they were weeks away, just maybe a week or two away, I think was the exact quote, from having enough enriched uranium to make nuclear weapons.
At that point, I knew it was game-set match.
I knew it was over.
I knew that the president would act.
It was just my knowledge of President Trump.
And there are really dumb people out there, and they're also angry people out there.
The dumb people are, they don't understand the Trump doctrine.
They'll never understand it.
They interpret the Trump doctrine, no boots on the ground, no forever wars as isolationism.
And that's wrong, as evidenced by his first term.
Again, defeating the ISIS Caliphate and taking out Soleimani in Baghdadi and dropping the mother of all bombs on Afghanistan.
That's not isolationism.
And the president was very, very clear on this.
And when, and after Midnight Hammer, you would think they understand Donald Trump says you cannot have a nuclear weapon.
Now, I played a montage yesterday.
I can replay it now.
Of all the Democrats over the years that have said repeatedly with nothing to back it up, except in the case of Obama and Biden, cargo planes full of cash and other currency, billions of dollars, which helped them build out their nuclear weaponry, help foment terror in the region, help them build out their massive ballistic missile systems and air defense systems.
But every Democrat said exactly what Donald Trump did.
Listen.
Okay, they need a second.
They didn't have it.
You weren't listening to the show because I gave you like 30 seconds lead into it.
But the point is, I don't think they were listening.
And the difference is Donald Trump is not Obama.
He's not Clinton.
He's not Biden.
And he's a man of his own mind.
And he listens to everybody.
I mean, he knows exactly what people are thinking.
You know, my understanding, there were people in his inner circle that were dead set against this.
And yet he did it anyway.
He made the choice.
And this is the frustrating part because they will have you believe that Donald Trump was acting at the behest of B.B. Nets and Yahoo.
No.
This is in America's best interest.
And the president said as much when he said this is about future generations.
And future generations should not be burdened with a nuclear-armed Iran.
And if you don't believe the Iranians are capable of using it and you're willing to take that risk, then I just strongly and fundamentally disagree with you.
We live in a free country.
You can have your own opinions, but your opinions can be wrong.
And I think this is a clear and present danger.
And I asked Witcoff that I'm going to play the whole interview later in the program.
Anyway, we have it.
Let's play it.
We will not allow Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon.
If I'm the president, we will attack Iran.
Whatever stage of development they might be in their nuclear weapons program in the next 10 years, during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel, we would be able to totally obliterate them.
That's a terrible thing to say, but those people who run Iran need to understand that.
Make no mistake, a nuclear-armed Iran is not a challenge that can be contained.
It would threaten the elimination of Israel, the security of Gulf nations, and the stability of the global economy.
It risks triggering a nuclear arms race in the region and the unraveling of the non-proliferation treaty.
That's why a coalition of countries is holding the Iranian government accountable.
And that's why the United States will do what we must to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Look, I mean, Iran has American blood on their hands, okay?
And what we saw in terms of just this attack on Israel, 200 ballistic missiles, what we need to do to ensure that Iran never achieves the ability to be a nuclear power, that is one of my highest priorities.
You really, it really is amazing, isn't it?
But the difference is the way they dealt with it is, oh, let us give you billions in cash and other currency.
We'll fly it right into Iran for you in cargo planes.
Thank you very much for the money.
Now we can foment more terrorism.
You know, as Wickoff, and again, I'll play the interview later.
You know, beyond 20% enrichment serves no civilian purposes.
Now, this is the other part of the offer, which shows the seriousness with which President Trump wanted a deal.
And they would offer as much civilian-use uranium as the Iranians would want for civilian purposes.
Obviously, you'd need any place, anywhere, anytime inspection, so they couldn't begin the process of secretly enriching that uranium.
And then we're back to where we started.
That could never be a part of the deal.
However, but as much civilian use, low-grade enriched uranium in perpetuity for free, and the Iranians rejected it.
At that point, you can only conclude that they learned nothing from Operation Midnight Hammer.
Deadlines mean nothing to them.
And then that led to this.
And then people want to say, well, Israel caused.
No, the president.
And this is where I go back to the lessons of history.
I was on with the Ruthless podcast guys, Linda, after the show yesterday, and I taped a segment with them.
And I just said, I wrote a whole book about this, and I've been saying this.
You know, if you don't recognize evil and take it seriously, when people say death to Israel, death to America, you have to ask yourself if you're willing to take that chance.
Are you willing to risk potentially a modern-day Holocaust, number one state sponsor of terror?
They obviously have been fomenting terror in the region forever.
They have been funding their proxies thanks to the money Biden, Obama gave them.
And now we're on the brink of a nuclear-armed Iran.
Now, for those that don't understand the mindset of convert or die and the mindset that if you strap bombs on young kids and send them to kill innocent men, women, and children, that you're doing the will of God and you'll be rewarded, or Allah, you'll be rewarded with 72 virgins in heaven.
That's a very, that's a death cult.
And the idea that some are willing to risk putting this burden on future generations with a nuclear-armed Iran, it is, to me, it is foolish.
It is stupid.
It is ignorant of history.
It's ignorant of Mao in China, Stalin in Russia, Hitler in Germany, Italy and fascism, and Mussolini.
And it is ignorant of Tojo in Japan.
It is ignorant of Pol Pot in the killing fields.
In the last century, over 100 million people killed.
Now, if you look at this through the prism of history, well, we need to, when threats like this emerge, ask yourself, is it in our best national interest, America's interest, America's first interest, to take this threat out, neutralize it while you can, before you risk the deaths of potentially hundreds of thousands of people.
And I think that the president made the right call.
And I made that argument in the lead up, but that's my argument.
You know, people in the media, he listened to Sean Hannity and Fox.
They don't know Donald Trump if they think that.
Just like when they would say, listen to Bibi, Linda, you know Donald Trump.
And we've now covered him for all these years on the world stage.
And I was one of his earliest supporters.
Do you think anybody can convince Donald Trump to do one thing that he does not want to do?
One thing?
No.
You remember he had a nickname for one particular individual and he was floating that nickname for a long time.
I'm like, don't do it.
Don't, don't, don't, don't do it.
And then he, you know, he listened.
He heard me, but he did what he wanted.
You know, it's just, it's just so asinine.
And I'm going to tell you what else has happened.
And there's a little bit deeper thing going on here.
There are people around him that are angry.
They're angry.
And there are people that, you know, have been fair weather friends supporters.
They're angry.
They're angry as hell, to be honest with you, because they tried to make their case.
They were willing to gamble that the Iranians could have nuclear weapons.
It's not in America's first interest, etc.
I don't know what their interpretation is.
I think it's naive and frankly ignorant of history and downright stupid.
But that's, you know, we live in a free country.
You can express your views.
But I think they're angry.
They did make the case.
They did plead with him.
And Donald Trump made up his own mind.
He'd listen to his intelligence community, John Ratcliffe and others.
He listened to his Secretary of State.
He listened to his Secretary of War.
He listened to General Kane, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs.
And he had information that I didn't have.
Ultimately, it's the president that has the information that will lead to the decision, the war planning, everything that goes along with this.
Anyway, that's where we find ourselves.
Anyway, Linda, I think there's just a lot of angry people out there.
They didn't get their way.
I don't know why that some people, I don't know.
I think of my father fighting in World War II.
And my father didn't love being in the Pacific.
He didn't like it at all.
Then he lost a lot of his friends.
And he never wanted to talk about it.
I used to beg him to talk about it.
He wouldn't talk about it.
And now I understand why.
I had an uncle that, you know, would be asleep.
He fought in World War II.
And this uncle, if a plane flew overhead at night in his sleep, would roll under the bed, like not even aware, not even awake, not even aware he's doing it.
Lessons of History and Freedom00:10:23
I mean, that's what I learned.
They didn't have a name for it then, but PTSD is real.
This stays with you.
It never goes away.
The price of freedom has been so high.
But if we don't learn from the lessons of history, we are doomed to repeat them.
It's that simple.
And I don't want our children and grandchildren, they fought that war so that we would have a safer America.
That's why they fought it.
They fought it because there was evil in their time.
And there's always evil.
Now, the lessons of history are if there is an emerging threat, I think the Trump doctrine is correct.
You know, take that threat out while you have an opportunity before you risk mass death.
It would be the greatest failure, in my view, of our generation of leadership if we saw the threat of radical mullahs in Iran, number one state sponsor of terror, chanting death to America, working so hard to get nuclear weapons.
We had a chance to neutralize it without having hundreds of thousands, God knows maybe potentially millions of deaths, and we didn't do it.
In my mind, that would forever be, you know, first I would blame, you know, Biden and Obama, but if it happened on Trump's watch, I guarantee you that history would not be kind to him.
And I think the president understands we've got to learn the lessons of history.
And it's sad.
I wish there wasn't evil.
When I went on the Deliver Us from Evil tour, you know, I said it's very hard for good people to wrap their minds around the fact that there is evil, but there is.
You know, the Bible tells, lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
Those aren't just words.
You know, Jesus tempted, you know, after 40 days fasting, and, you know, I'll give you the whole world, the devil says.
And, you know, Satan, you know, get lost.
I don't think that's an exact quote from the Bible, is it, Linda?
I mean, it sounded good to me.
You definitely had a heck of a time paraphrasing there.
That was fun.
I enjoyed it.
Well, you get the point.
But I wish this didn't happen.
I wish we didn't have to put our national treasure in harm's way ever.
But it's not realistic.
By the way, the president, again, demanding, and I think Australia, to their credit, has stepped up to the plate.
These Iranian, what were they, soccer players?
I think they were soccer players.
The Asian Cup was in Australia.
And the Iranian women's soccer team stood silently with their hands by their sides, refusing to sing the Iranian national anthem.
Subsequently, the women signed SOS signals as the team was boarding a tour bus.
They knew a target was on their back.
Trump immediately responded, I'll call on Australia to grant asylum to these brave women.
If Australia will not do it, the United States will.
And the Iranian women's soccer team removed their hijabs as soon as they were granted asylum in Australia.
It was never a choice.
99% of women in Iran will also take off their hijabs if this Islamic regime falls.
One thing that's going to have to happen eventually, and I don't know if you saw Prime Minister Netanyahu's quote, Linda, did you happen to see it?
He tells the Iranian people, now, whenever President Trump says, seize the moment, this may be a once-in-a-generation opportunity.
The president is not about nationbuilding.
This is going to eventually end up in the hands of the Iranian people.
And the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu knows that as well.
We quoted yesterday, the president of Israel, Hersag, made the statement that, no, he doesn't expect either Israeli or American troops on the ground.
The only operation I could see it may happen for is if there is 60% enriched uranium, that can't end up in the wrong hands.
But anyway, the prime minister sent a message to the people in Iran on a post on X implying that conditions for a revolution against the regime would soon be met, and the Iranian people would then have the opportunity to pursue regime change.
Quote, your dreams will become a reality.
When the time is right and that time is fast approaching, we will pass the torch to you.
Be ready to seize the moment.
Really echoing President Trump's initial statements and the president also saying this is about the future.
And Trump intends to go all the way with this move.
Senior Israeli intelligence officials telling the Jerusalem Post the U.S. intended to continue.
And, you know, as Pete Hegseth and Raisin Kane, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, have been saying, the U.S. strike on Iranian oil, their biggest hub, which is Karg Island, handles 90 to 95% of Iran's crude exports and sits near critical Strait of Hormuz.
By the way, the Jerusalem Post is reporting.
Now, first of all, they had a tough time electing, obviously, this special council that they put together that's in charge of picking the new supreme leader.
You know, they wiped out the initial, right during the initial vote, they knew where everybody was.
This is after they wiped out the supreme leader and all of his top, all the top leadership in Iran.
But Iranian state television reported that the son of the supreme leader, now the new supreme leader, has been wounded, though the broadcast didn't provide details about the circumstances, the injury, the severity.
It didn't indicate when the injury occurred or whether it affected his day-to-day responsibilities.
I don't know, Linda.
I don't think I want the job of supreme leader.
Do you want that job?
I think I'll pass.
I would actually think our job is hard.
I'm going to go in there and we'll change it all.
I'll end the war tomorrow.
Oh, boy.
No more Burkinis in Iran.
I'll tell you what.
No way.
Put me in, coach.
I'm ready.
Put me in.
What would you do, Linda?
Tell me how you would rearrange the government.
I would give everybody back their rights.
I would make it a full republic.
It's a democracy if you can keep it, right?
I would allow them to have open and fair elections.
They could elect the person that makes the most sense for the people.
It's a republic if you can keep it.
You're quoting.
I said it backwards.
Whatever.
Moving on.
So we would get everybody to go.
We would have election integrity.
We put all the things in place so they never suffer from what we got going on here with the Save America Act.
And we would get everybody the right.
We'd eradicate IRGC.
We'd have no more influence from any of these Hamasas and Hezbollahs and Houthis and Kurds.
It would be their own country.
They would be able to go back to the way it was when Persia was the way of Iran.
It would be amazing.
It would be a better Iran.
It'd be a safer world.
U.S., by the way, is sending B-52 bombers to Iran.
It's still America's deadliest weapon.
70 years of service, B-52s.
Remember, we used to call him B-1 Bob Dornan?
I loved Bob Dornan.
Bob Dornan was great.
Iran's missile fire rate has collapsed by 92%.
That is an unbelievable Operation Roaring Lion, Epic Fury from March 9th with a scenario modeling through March 23rd.
Anyway, the anti-missile battery fire inception, it's going at a much better rate.
I mean, and God bless our brave men and women.
I mean, it's the greatest military on the face of the earth.
And to watch the precision, the intelligence gathering capabilities of both nations and United Forces.
And then you have to ask yourself: by the way, huge crowds are now gathering in Tehran for a pro-regime funeral.
Anyway, for the Iranian military commanders who were killed in strikes.
I assume you're going to have holdovers.
That's going to raise the specter of, okay, how do the people can't win a revolution with a slingshot?
And I've been bringing this point up for a long time, too.
Central, by the way, did you check the price of a barrel of oil?
Because it went down dramatically yesterday.
What is it at?
It's at $85.95.
It's up.
Okay, so it's a little bit up from yesterday, but nowhere near the highs of where it was 115.
U.S. Central Command issued a warning to civilians that the Iranian regime is using civilian ports along the Strait of Hormuz to conduct military operations that threaten international shipping.
U.S. forces urging civilians in Iran to immediately avoid all port facilities where Iranian naval forces are operating.
I mean, they already took out like 20 of their ships that were in the region.
I mean, there's always been the threat that they will mine that considering, I guess it's anywhere between 20 and 30, 33 percent of the world's oil supply passes through there on any one given day.
And, you know, that's why this, you know, an island a third the size of New York City controls virtually all Iranian crude oil exports.
It's Karg Island, 16 miles off the Iranian coast in the Persian Gulf, making it difficult to defend and easier to isolate, reportedly drawing the attention of the administration.
We'll see what happens with that.
Tom Cotton puts Biden on notice while demanding answers on draining the nation's oil stockpile.
Well, we know why he did it.
He did it for the midterm elections in 2022.
That's not a surprise.
You know, as Trump says, the U.S. military completely destroyed 10 inactive mine-laying boats.
Now it's 20 as of today.
Over 5,000 military targets have been hit.
And every day they get more, our attacks get bigger and more effective and stronger and more targeted.
I mean, it is unbelievable.
Strategic Defense and Military Might00:02:27
They're incredible.
And if you wonder about the president wanting $1.5 trillion for the military, understand we need the next generation of weaponry.
You're seeing it unfold here.
And it is, you know, we're lucky that we have had people like Donald Trump in office, Ronald Reagan that built up our nation's military might.
You know, people laughed at strategic defense.
They laughed at Reagan.
They made fun of him.
They called it Star Wars.
You'd turn on the media, the legacy media mob, and the legacy media mob would do what they always do.
They'd create their little, you know, animations of rockets being, you know, missiles being taken out of the air, and it's Star Wars, and they were making fun of it.
Guess what?
Star Wars is a reality.
That's why the president's vision for a golden dome to protect the entire United States and maybe the world and share it is incredible.
Anyway, so the new Supreme Leader is injured, and we're watching events on the ground.
Our prayers or thoughts are with all of those people that put themselves in harm's way.
It's very, very, very dangerous, what they have to do.
And the success has been incredible.
President Trump said after, I guess he spoke to the families.
We've lost seven Americans so far.
And he said the message that he keeps getting from the families, don't let them die in vain.
Finish the job.
Because they understand the military has a different mindset, different understanding.
At least that's been my life experience when I talk to people in the military.
You know, they understand the danger of the mission.
They know what they sign up for.
But they understand that this is about something bigger, longer-term thinking, strategic thinking.
And, you know, we'll never know how many lives may have been saved by preventing Iran from ever getting a nuclear weapon.
We'll never know.
Unbelievable.
You talk about selfless, you talk about great Americans, you talk about the best of the best, and that's it.