BREAKING: Trump wants "a real end" to the nuclear problem with Iran and this morning will find him in the White House Situation Room, monitoring developments in Middle East, he told us during his midnight departure from Canada.
"I didn't say I was looking for a ceasefire," he said on AF1. He said he wants "a real end," with Iran "giving up entirely" on nukes.
The Israelis aren't slowing up their barrage on Iran, he predicted. "You're going to find out over the next two days. You're going to find out. Nobody's slowed up so far."
Asked his thinking on calling for Tehran to evacuate, he told me he wants "people to be safe."
He needs to be present at the White House, not Canada, where he can be "well versed" and not have to rely on phones to know what's happening, he said.
Trump sounded undecided about sending Witkoff and/or VP Vance to meet with Iran. "I may," he said. But "it depends what happens when I get back," he said.
On any threat to US interests, he said Iran knows not to touch our troops. US would "come down so hard if they do anything to our people," he said.
Trump declined to say if the chairman of joint chiefs and SecDef have provided him with planning options should Iran attack U.S. bases in Middle East. "I can't tell you that," he told me.
Trump told me "we'll be talking to them" when asked if the Gang of Eight was briefed on anything yet. But "it's not necessary," he said.
Asked if US involvement would destroy Iran nuclear program, hope their program "is wiped out long before that."
