Pete Hegseth rips into the media for overshadowing ‘historic’ Iran strikes as Trump admin grapples with intel leak fallout: Live updates

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth defended President Donald Trump’s airstrike on Iran and blasted the media that reported on an intelligence assessment that cast doubt on its success.

‘Let me read the bottom line here,’ Hegseth said during a press conference at the Pentagon. ‘President Trump directed the most complex and secretive military operation in history and it was resounding success resulting in a ceasefire agreement and the end of the 12-day war.’

He then when on to criticize CNN, MSNBC, the New York Times and other outlets that reported on a preliminary intelligence report that said little damage was done to Iran’s nuclear program.

‘It is preliminary. It points out it is not coordinated with the intelligence community at all, there is low-confidence in this report, there are gaps in,’ he said.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth pushed back against a charge he didn’t acknowledge the female pilots who were on the mission.

The defense secretary laughed when a reporter asked him: ‘Why not acknowledge female pilots that participated in the mission? The early messages congratulated the boys.’

‘When I say boy bombers – this is what the press does,’ he said.

‘The chairman mentioned a female bomber pilot, that’s fantastic, she’s fantastic, she’s a hero. I want more female bomber pilots. I hope men and women sign up to do brave things,’ he added.

Then he blasted the media for being politically correct.

‘When you spin it because I say boys and bombers is a common phrase, I will keep saying things,’ he said, adding: ‘I am proud of that female pilot.’

‘I don’t care if it is a male or female in the cockpit and American people don’t care. It is obsession with race and gender in this department that has changed priorities and we don’t do that anymore. We don’t play your little games.’

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth blasted Fox News’ Jennifer Griffin for her coverage of the airstrikes in Iran.

‘Jennifer, you have been about the worst – the one who misrepresents the most intentionally what the president says,’ he told her.

Hegseth criticized her after she asked him about reports Iran had removed its enriched uranium from its nuclear sites ahead of the airstrike.

Griffin, a longtime and well-respected national security reporter, looked shocked at Hegseth’s accusation and pushed back at his charge.

‘I was first to describe the B-2 bombers, the mission, with great accuracy, I take issue with that,’ she told him.

Hegseth backed down and acknowledged her reporting.

‘I appreciate you acknowledging that most successful mission based on operational security this department has done, I appreciate that,’ he said.

Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, described the crew who flew the bombers that launched the airstrike in Iran.

He said the oldest soldier was a 28-year-old captain and the youngest was a 21-year-old private.

Caine said he talked with the crews and they told him how they landed back at Whitman Air Force Base in Missouri to ‘incredible cheers of their families.

‘A lot of flags and a lot of tears. One commander told me these are moments in the lives of our families they will never forget.’

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said ‘first reports are almost always wrong’ as he continued to blast a preliminary intelligence assessment that said the Iran airstrikes didn’t decimate that country’s nuclear program.

‘First reports are almost always wrong. They’re almost always incomplete,’ he said.

He told the press: ‘Your job is to step back and assess them, that is why we urge caution about putting entire stories on biassed leaks to biased publications trying to make something look bad.’

The defense secretary pointed to the massive firepower that struck three Iran nuclear sites, including one at Fordow.

‘Anyone with two eyes, some ears and a brain can recognize that kind of firepower with that specificity at that location will have a devastating effect,’ he said.

Hegseth added: ‘If you want to know what is going on at Fordow, go and get a big shove.’

Nato chief Mark Rutte has been forced to backtrack on an embarrassing remark – where he apparently called US president Donald Trump ‘daddy.’

During a meeting of the defence bloc in the Hague yesterday, Rutte and Trump met following the US president’s crass comment on the Iran-Israel war.

It was there that the US President he said: ‘We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the f*** they’re doing.’

Rutte said on Wednesday that ‘Daddy has to use strong language’ to get Israel and Iran to sort things out, to which Trump agreed.

‘You have to use strong language. Every once in a while you have to use a certain word,’ the president said.

Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, praised the work of soldiers who flew bombers that launched the airstrike in Iran.

He described their reaction to the bombing, saying they called it ‘the brightest explosion I’ve ever seen.’

‘We know that the trailing jets saw the first weapons function and pilots stated this was the brightest explosion I’ve ever seen, it literally looked like daylight,’ he said at press conference at the Pentagon.

‘They were male and female aviators on this mission and a crew member told me when I talked to them on video the other day that this felt like the Super Bowl,’ he added.

He went on to say he had ‘chills’ as details about the mission were unveiled.

President Donald Trump claimed several media outlets will be firing reporters who wrote about a preliminary intelligent report casting doubt on the success of his Iran mission.

‘Rumor is that the Failing New York Times and Fake News CNN will be firing the reporters who made up the FAKE stories on the Iran Nuclear sites because they got it so wrong. Lets see what happens?,’ he wrote on Truth Social.

CNN and the New York Times put out statements standing behind their staff and their reporting.

Donald Trump ‘completely obliterated’ Iran‘s top secret Fordow nuclear site with 14 massive 30,000-pound ‘bunker buster’ bombs.

Two other nuclear sites in Iran were also ‘wiped out’ with 30 Tomahawk missiles launched from U.S. submarines 400 miles away.

The details were first revealed by Sean Hannity of Fox News, who spoke to the president shortly after the strikes.

Read more below as the Pentagon unveils more evidence that the nuclear labs were destroyed.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth accused the media of reporting on a preliminary intelligent report casting doubt on the success of President Donald Trump’s Iran airstrike for ‘political purposes.’

He also blasted those who leaked the report to the press. The FBI is investigating the leak.

‘Time and time again classified information is leaked or pedaled for political purposes to try to make the president look bad,’ he said.

‘So many aspects of what our men and women did, because of hatred of this press corps are undermined because people are trying to leak and spin continually it wasn’t successful. It is irresponsible.’

Hegseth accused the press of undermining the military.

‘You are undermining success of incredible pilots and incredible refuelers and incredible defenders who accomplished their mission, setback a nuclear program in ways other presidents would have dreamed,’ he said.

Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has said the United States hit Tehran’s nuclear sites but achieved ‘nothing significant’, as he vowed his country would ‘never surrender’ to its enemies.

Khamenei condemned what he called Donald Trump’s ‘showmanship’ and claimed that the US President ‘exaggerated’ the impact of the strikes on three nuclear sites ‘because he needed to.’

‘Anyone who heard [Trump’s] remarks could tell there was a different reality behind his words – they could do nothing,’ the 86-year-old Iranian leader said.

The supreme leader also declared victory over Israel, despite scores of top officials and nuclear scientists being assassinated by Iran’s arch enemy over the course of the 12-day conflict.

Both Iran and Israel had already claimed they won the short-lived confrontation, the deadliest and most destructive in their shared history, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hailing on it a ‘historic victory’ for Israel.

Khamenei broke his silence on the US strikes in a video broadcast on Iranian state television from his bunker hideout, his first appearance since June 19 and first public comments since a ceasefire was declared.

Tulsi Gabbard is rumored to be in Donald Trump‘s ‘line of fire’ as she has been sidelined ahead of a much-anticipated intelligence briefing to Congress to detail Trump’s recent strikes on Iran‘s nuclear facilities.

Now, the spy chief will be absent on Thursday as Trump officials offer Congress evidence of how successful the strikes were. Trump has angrily insisted CNN and The New York Times were wrong in saying they had minimal effect.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ripped the media during his press conference at the Pentagon, saying it’s in ‘your blood to cheer against Trump.’

Hegseth passionately defended Saturday’s air strike on Iran and blasted the media for reporting on an early intelligence assessment that cast doubt on its success.

‘I mean specifically you, the press corps, because you cheer against Trump so hard, like it’s in your DNA and in your blood to cheer against Trump. You want him not to be successful so bad, you have to cheer against the efficacy of the strikes. You have to hope they were not effective.’

For all the twists and turns of the ’12 Day War’ between Israel and Iran – including President Donald Trump’s decision to drop bombs on three Iranian nuclear sites – the president’s approval rating remained extraordinarily stable.

A new Daily Mail/J.L. Partners poll found that Trump’s approval rating stood at 47 percent.

It was also 47 percent on June 6, before Israel made the decision to start bombing Iran on June 12, with the goal of obliterating the Islamic regime’s nuclear program.

And it was 47 percent on June 18, three days before the U.S. got involved.

The president’s disapproval rating stayed at 53 percent throughout.