MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough Defends Trump Over Strikes on Iran: Hillary Clinton Would Have Done the Same Thing

Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough defended President Donald Trump’s decision to target Iran’s fortified uranium enrichment facilities over the weekend, arguing that previous presidents — and even Hillary Clinton — “would have felt compelled to take that strike.”

The attacks, carried out using 30,000-pound bunker-busting bombs, targeted Fordow, Isfahan and Natanz. The Fordow facility, buried beneath a mountain, is believed to have sustained direct hits, though U.S. officials are still assessing the extent of the damage.

Scarborough noted that he was “not championing either side,” but could not see how previous presidents, Democratic and Republican, would have handled the situation differently.

I said on Thursday or Friday, the president had no good options. What would Monday look like if he hadn’t have moved? If Iran wasn’t already at 60% [enrichment] and an ability to create nuclear weapons in a short matter of time, right?

I mean, there, I, again, I’m not this morning – I’m not championing either side of this. Although I ask you, how difficult would it have been for any president to not take that shot if they knew that Iran was even being attacked by the United Nations?

I find it hard to believe that Bush 41, Bush 43, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, you know, go down the list, any president wouldn’t have felt compelled to take that strike.

Washington Post columnist and Morning Joe panelist David Ignatius agreed and noted that Trump had “inherited” the “battle plan” from previous presidents who had “considered
precisely this scenario” where “diplomacy wasn’t working.”

“His choices were debased at the moment. He had to make the decision,” Ignatius added.

Earlier in the show, during a conversation with MSNBC contributor Katty Kay, Scarborough quoted former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger while observing that Trump faced only “difficult choices.”

The host said: “Henry Kissinger famously said that when you’re sitting in the White House and trying to make a decision on foreign policy, the possibility of war, you’re never handed a good decision and a bad decision. You’re handed two very difficult choices. And the president made that choice.”

Watch above via MSNBC.