President Trump insisted Sunday that toppling Iran’s government was never something he cared about, a claim that directly contradicts a long record of his own public statements over the past year in which he urged Iranians to seize control of their government, declared that the United States had already achieved “regime change,” and openly asked why there shouldn’t be one.
“As far as regime change, I never cared about regime change,” Trump told The Wall Street Journal on Sunday. “This is the third group we’ve dealt with, and this is the most rational group yet.” The remark came as the United States and Iran confirmed a war-ending memorandum of understanding, with a signing ceremony set for June 19 in Switzerland.
The disavowal stands in stark contrast to what Trump and his administration said when the war began and in the months that followed.
When the US and Israel launched their campaign on February 28, Trump addressed the Iranian people directly and called on them to overthrow their leaders. “I say tonight that the hour of your freedom is at hand,” Trump said in a video posted to social media. “When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will be probably your only chance for generations.” He added: “America is backing you with overwhelming strength and devastating force.”
Hours after the first strikes, Trump told the Washington Post: “All I want is freedom for the people.”
Both Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu indicated at the outset that the goal of the strikes was regime change, calling on civilians to seize control of the government once its military and institutions were crippled.
A month into the war, Trump went further, claiming the objective had already been met. “I think we’ll make a deal with them, pretty sure, but we’ve had regime change,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One in late March, citing the number of Iranian leaders killed in the conflict. “We’re dealing with different people than anybody’s dealt with before. It’s a whole different group of people. So I would consider that regime change.”
That assessment matches what Trump said Sunday in a different register. In claiming Sunday that he is now dealing with “the third group” and “the most rational group yet,” Trump again referenced the turnover in Iranian leadership produced by the war, the same turnover he previously characterized as regime change he had achieved.
The pattern of openly embracing regime change extends back to the 2025 conflict. After US strikes on three Iranian nuclear sites in June 2025, and just hours after Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Sunday talk shows that the US did not want regime change, Trump wrote on Truth Social: “It’s not politically correct to use the term, ‘Regime Change,’ but if the current Iranian Regime is unable to MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN, why wouldn’t there be a Regime change??? MIGA!!!”
Throughout the war, Trump’s own subordinates repeatedly contradicted him in the other direction, insisting regime change was not the aim even as the president embraced it. “This mission was not and has not been about regime change,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said. Vance told NBC’s “Meet the Press” during the 2025 strikes: “We don’t want a regime change. We want to end the nuclear program, and then we want to talk to the Iranians about a long-term settlement here.”
The mixed messaging reflects what critics have called the central contradiction of Trump’s Iran policy. Trump had explicitly positioned himself against regime-change wars in the Middle East, declaring in a policy address: “Our policy of never-ending war, regime change, and nation-building is being replaced by the clear-eyed pursuit of American interests. It is the job of our military to protect our security, not to be the policeman of the” region.
Trump’s Sunday disavowal also lands at an awkward moment for the administration’s broader claims about the war. The deal reportedly fails to achieve any of the goals of the war set out by the US and Israel, including eliminating Iran’s nuclear weapons program, depleting its ballistic missile stockpile, ending its support for terror proxies, and creating the conditions for the fall of the regime. Iran’s military said it “humiliated” the United States and Israel in a statement issued after the agreement was announced.
The new Iranian leadership that emerged from the war may also be less accommodating than what came before. The killing of the country’s top leaders by the US and Israel appears to have strengthened and emboldened the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, and Iran’s new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, is considered more radical than his late father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)
9 Responses
Absolutely. Trump has done a complete 180 degree flip. If the currently available deal details are correct, Trump has managed to seize defeat from the jaws of victory. Perhaps he’s being advised to dump Israel and close America’s military presence in the Middle East to gain congressional seats in the midterms. It won’t move that needle one iota. Shame on Trump for destroying his own potential legacy.
“Those comments then attributed to me, were all ai.” DJT never said the goal was to cause the regime to topple: “after all the Ayatolas are very honorable people! They dress very nicely and they’re my friends.”
You cannot regime change by throwing bombs
A complete and easily demonstrable liar. The worst president in history.
@RT
He has saved the country from the policies of the prior administration which drove up inflation and essentially discontinued the border. He is obviously, therefore, among the best Presidents in history, so only a TDS-crazed lunatic could claim he is the “worst President in history”.
Your TDS is obnoxious and pointless. If you’re going to criticize the President, then at least bring facts to that discussion.
The headline is pathetic: “COMPLETE 180…reversing months of his own statements”.
The article points out that the President stated that “the objective had already been met. “…we’ve had regime change…We’re dealing with different people than anybody’s dealt with before. It’s a whole different group of people. So I would consider that regime change.”
You could argue that change doesn’t go far enough, but you cannot argue that it is a “COMPLETE 180” and so on.
HaKatan
Most of us (99%) voted for Trump, we thought he would be better than others and indeed in many ways he has been.
However, STOP 🛑 GASLIGHTING us, we are not stupid, the world in general are not that stupid to recognize that Trump made himself look like the biggest FOOL out there.
Iran has called his bluff dozens of times, he came across weak, begging for a deal. This is not what a WINNER looks like!
Yes, Israel and the US killed many of the leaders of the old regime, but that regime is still VERY MUCH IN POWER. Trump and Bibi tried to gaslight us by suggesting there was regime change. We are not stupid!!!! Let’s call a spade a spade!!!
He makes fun of Obama with regards to Iran, yet he is so much worse, in so many different levels. Besides the begging like a looser, and besides giving up billions more, besides Iran spitting and laughing at the USA, besides all this after the regime killed more than 40,000 of their own people, besides promising the people help, Trump’s biggest mistake was that he was beaten in the war itself, the biggest deterrent the US had was its army and now they have shown that it’s not so mighty, if you hold out a little you can deplete the ammunition pretty quickly, while inflicting heavy price on the US economy, bringing even the STRONG TRUMP to his knees.
Yes America has nukes and expensive weapons, but that’s precisely what brought them down, they don’t have large cheap bombs 💣 to take out the enemy, so if they don’t get a quick victory they will be the ones loosing. Lot more to say!
Bottom dollar, Trump is acting like the biggest loser.
אין לנו להישען אלא על אבינו שבשמים
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One could argue differently, but that is besides the point.
The point remains that the headline is not accurate.
Obviously, the President could have sent that whole country back to the Stone Age if he had chosen to do that. He chose instead to make a deal.
Let’s see what happens from here.
In his parallel Trump Universe, a big beautiful universe, the deal is a huge success. Whoever says the Emperor is naked gets fired.