Trump’s antiwar claims don’t hold up in leaked group chat

On election night 2024, President Donald Trump vowed to end wars in the Middle East. That promise is now in question after a leaked group chat revealed plans for airstrikes on Houthi rebels in Yemen.

On Monday, journalist Jeffrey Goldberg reported that he was mistakenly invited to group chat on the messaging app Signal where Trump officials were discussing the top secret raid. Goldberg was invited to the chat by National Security Advisor Mike Waltz.

“I’m going to be responsible and not disclose the things that I read and saw,” Goldberg told MSNBC. “I will describe them to you: the specific time of a future attack, specific targets—including human targets meant to be killed in that attack—weapon systems, and even weather reports … It was a minute-by-minute accounting of what was about to happen.”

Goldberg’s inclusion on the chat has been described as a national security blunder, with some Democrats now calling for Waltz to resign. But the episode also threatens to rob Trump of one of his most salient issues.

A Wall Street Journal poll from October found that most swing-state voters believed Trump would handle foreign conflicts better than Vice President Kamala Harris. A separate poll showed that most swing-state voters also saw Trump as an antiwar candidate.

Trump positioned himself as antiwar during his first presidential campaign, when he was one of the few Republican primary candidates to denounce the Iraq War. In the general election, he repeatedly criticized former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for voting in support of the war in 2002.

“The war in Iraq was a big, fat mistake,” he said in Feb. 2016.

Trump promised and failed to end the Afghanistan War in his first term. He nearly broke a vow to not start any new conflicts when he ordered airstrikes against Iran in 2019 before calling them off at the last minute.

During his 2024 campaign, Trump vowed to end the Russia-Ukraine conflict within 24 hours and broker a lasting ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Neither promise has materialized.

Trump has faced criticism for appeasing Russian President Vladimir Putin, who launched the invasion of Ukraine in 2022. As part of his proposed peace deal, Trump has pushed for Ukraine to cede territory to Russia. Earlier this month, he briefly halted military aid to Ukraine, further fueling concerns about his stance.

In Israel, Trump claimed credit for a ceasefire with Hamas that took effect just before he assumed office. That agreement quickly fell apart and hostilities resumed.

The U.S. has been in conflict with the Houthis since January 2024. The rebel group has been attacking shipping vessels in the Red Sea in retaliation for Israel’s war in Gaza. Trump said earlier this month that the Houthis would be “completely annihilated.”

James R. Holmes, a strategist at the Naval War College in Rhode Island, told the New York Times that he believed the administration’s attacks on Houthis were unlikely to succeed, partially because airstrikes alone would be ineffective.

“You have to control turf to win,” Holmes said. “Aircraft cannot occupy territory, however valuable a supporting capability they are for armies and Marines.”

There were signs that public opinion on Trump’s antiwar credentials was shifting even before the leaked group chat. An Ipsos poll from early March found that only 37% of respondents approved of his handling of foreign policy, while 50% disapproved.

The White House insists that it will secure peace in Yemen, Ukraine, and Israel.