Washington– Twice on Monday, Mr. President Donald Trump He said he extracted a confession of sorts from one of his predecessors in the Oval Office, who he said expressed regret in a private conversation about not doing so. Attacking Iran the way Trump did For more than two weeks.
But there’s just a small problem: Representatives for the four living former presidents — three Democrats and one Republican — said none of them had communicated with Trump recently.
Trump refused to mention the former president’s name when reporters asked him who he was, saying he did not want to “embarrass” him.
The Republican president first told the story during lengthy remarks about the Iran war as he opened his dialogue Kennedy Center Board of Trustees meeting. Trump is the chairman and the meeting was held at the White House.
He reiterated that Iran had been a threat to the United States for decades, but said he was the only president who had the courage to do something about it.
“Look, for 47 years, no president has been willing to do what I do, and they should have done it a long time ago,” he said. “It would have been a lot easier. No president wants to do that.”
Trump continued: “And yet, every president knew that. I talked to a certain president, who I actually like, a former president, a former president. He said, ‘I wish I had done that, I wish I had done that,’ but they didn’t do it. I do it.”
When asked which former president he spoke to, Trump said: “I can’t tell you that. I don’t want to embarrass him. It would be very bad for his career, even though he doesn’t have a career.”
Representatives for former Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Joe Biden said they had not spoken with Trump recently. The individuals spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the former presidents’ private conversations.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment after being informed that none of the former presidents said they had spoken with Trump recently.
Trump and the four former presidents last met in the same place when he was inaugurated on January 20, 2025, that is, long before the war.
He has been highly critical of Biden and Obama, often saying Biden is “the worst president in the history of our country” and accusing Obama of negotiating a “horrible deal” with Iran over its nuclear weapons. Trump withdrew the United States from that agreement the first time he took office.
But the Republican recently made sympathetic comments toward Clinton, saying it “disturbs” him that the former president was called upon to speak. Filing before Congress About his friendship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
“I loved Bill Clinton,” Trump said in an interview with NBC News on February 4. “I still love Bill Clinton.” “I liked his behavior towards me. I thought he understood me. He understood me.”
Trump repeated his story about discussing Iran with a former president later Monday in the Oval Office, where he announced that Vice President J.D. Vance would lead a task force created to root out fraud in federal benefits programs.
“Was it George W. Bush?” one reporter asked.
“No,” Trump said.
“Was it Bill Clinton?” The reporter asked.
“I don’t want to say. I don’t want to say,” Trump said, then added, “It’s a guy I like. And I like that guy, and he’s a smart guy. But that guy said, ‘I wish I did that,’ OK, but I don’t want to get into who, well. I don’t want to get them in trouble.”