U.S. President Donald Trump attends a ceremony marking the 24th anniversary of the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States at the Pentagon, in Washington D.C., U.S., September 11, 2025. REUTERS Evelyn Hockstein
President Donald Trump’s war against Iran has politically “backfired” terribly, a prominent centrist think tank scholar and columnist argued on Wednesday.
“When the current war began, public support was lower than for any other major conflict undertaken in nearly a century,” explained Wall Street Journal columnist William A. Galston. “Before attacking Iran, however, Mr. Trump offered only a cursory rationale to Congress and the American people. The need for surprise might conceivably have justified his near-silence on such a grave matter.”
He added, “But there is no justification for his failure to offer a systematic and sustained case for the war once it began,” describing Trump’s unilateral approach to global conflict as having “backfired” with average support for the war falling to 39 percent.
“The American people don’t think that the president has clearly explained the goals of the war, and the share who think he has done so is smaller today than it was at the beginning,” Galston said. “Americans have concluded that the war will weaken the economy and leave the country less safe. They believe that it is a war of choice, not necessity, and that it is going badly. And despite the administration’s call for short-term sacrifice, people reject paying more for gasoline as their patriotic duty by a margin of 2 to 1.”
Lest anyone doubt the immediate political implications of these findings for Trump, Galston pointed out that the president is losing support among precisely those groups that gravitated toward him in 2024.
“One quarter of the Americans who voted for him in 2024 disapprove of his Iran policy, and this disapproval is especially high among groups who moved strongly toward him during that election: 56% among young adults, 62% for Hispanics and independents,” Galston wrote. “These statistics signal more than a political threat for Mr. Trump and the Republicans who must face voters this fall. They represent a challenge to the democratic legitimacy of the most solemn decision that a nation can make.”
He ultimately opined, “It’s up to the president to conclude this war in the way that does the least damage to our national interest—and to the people’s waning confidence in their public institutions.”
Influential conservative thought leaders are also turning on the Iran war. Megyn Kelly reported that she had “serious doubts” shortly after the invasion, while former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene suggested Trump had literally gone insane. Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson accused Trump of going to war for Israel, saying “this happened because Israel wanted it to happen. This is Israel’s war,” adding that “this country has certainly been manipulated a lot by Israeli intelligence—and other foreign countries’ intelligence, but certainly by Israeli intelligence.” He was joined by the pro-Trump Hodge Twins, a pair of popular MAGA influencers, similarly said that “we are at war for Israel. Thanks for confirming.”
Finally popular right-wing podcaster Joe Rogan said after Trump invaded Iran that “it just seems so insane, based on what he ran on. I mean, this is why a lot of people feel betrayed, right? He ran on, ‘No more wars,’ ‘End these stupid, senseless wars,’ and then we have one that we can’t even really clearly define why we did it.” Meanwhile former Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Ill.), a former Trump supporter, cited the invasion as proof that Trump supporters are in a cult.
“And you don’t like when people call you a cult, Trump voters?” Walsh argued. “What else are people to think when you voted for Trump to get us the hell out of wars around the world, and instead he gets us involved in wars around the world and starts new wars, and you still sing his praises and support him? What are we to think, MAGA, but that you are a cult?”
He wrapped it up, “You’ve got no argument against people calling you a cult. And if he takes us to war against Iran, and you clap and applaud and throw him flowers, Trump supporters, I will be at the front of the parade calling you a cult.”