45th and 47th U.S. President, US Executive Branch & The Trump Organization
Trump says ‘I love the inflation’ as Iran war continues to spike prices
NBC News Correspondents Monica Alba, Courtney Kube and Brian Cheung join Meet the Press NOW to report on recent developments in the war with Iran after the President Trump vowed to attack the country “hard” again while inflation jumps to its highest point since 2023.
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About Donald Trump
President Trump attended the G7 summit in France in June 2026, where he held press conferences and bilateral meetings with world leaders including French President Emmanuel Macron and UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. Trump stated that on June 14 the U.S. reached a memorandum of understanding with Iran that he said would end the current conflict, reopen the Strait of Hormuz, and prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. He described the agreement as a "wall against a nuclear weapon" and contrasted it with the previous JCPOA, which he called a "road to a nuclear weapon." Trump said the Strait of Hormuz was partially open and would be fully open by June 19, and he claimed oil prices were dropping and the stock market was rising as a result of the deal. He also said he had spoken with leaders of Qatar, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Turkey about the agreement. During the summit, Trump also addressed other topics. He said he had conversations with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin regarding the war in Ukraine, describing it as more difficult than expected. Trump discussed U.S. investment figures, stating that over $19 trillion was being invested in the United States. He commented on domestic issues including voter ID requirements, crime reduction in several U.S. cities, and the "Save America Act." Trump also referenced a UFC event held at the White House and joked with reporters about taking credit for the Iran deal or blaming Vice President JD Vance if it did not work out.
Transcript (27 segments)
✨ AI-enhanced transcript with speaker attribution
K
Kristen Welker0:03
I'm Kristen Welker in Washington, where President Trump is vowing escalation in Iran, announcing the U.S. will carry out new military strikes today as his administration grapples with the economic fallout of the war. With the Dow tumbling and new numbers showing inflation rising to its highest... warned Iran will have to pay the price after taking too long to agree to a peace deal. It came after the U.S. and Iran exchanged strikes overnight, after the president accused Iran of downing a U.S. Apache helicopter patrolling the Strait of Hormuz, while Tehran accused the U.S. of using the crash as a pretext for strikes. From the Oval Office today, NBC's Garrett Haake pressed the president about that social media post and what comes next in the war.
G
Garrett Haake0:52
You posted this morning about Iran. You said that they've taken too long to get to a deal. And I want to make sure I quote you correctly. You said that now they will have to pay the price. What did you mean by that specifically?
D
Donald Trump1:04
Well, we're going to be attacking them and attacking them very hard.
G
Garrett Haake1:07
Resuming bombing.
D
Donald Trump1:08
Yeah. Well, we are based on the helicopter. I guess we have the right to do that. You know, they shot down a very, very incredible, actually an incredible machine. And at first they said they didn't do it. Then they admitted they did it. I've been working with Iran for a number of months, and they should sign their deal. It's a good deal that doesn't give them the right to have a nuclear weapon. In fact, it totally prohibits them from ever having a nuclear weapon. So we'll see what happens. But we hit them hard yesterday and we're going to hit them again hard today.
K
Kristen Welker1:48
Now, it comes after my interview with the president on Friday, when he drew this new red line for renewing military action against Iran. Listen, I want to know what your red line is. What would trigger you to restart military action? Would it be Iran killing more American citizens?
D
Donald Trump2:09
Well, certainly that would be something that I would think about very seriously. But my red line would be if I think I wasn't going to make a deal or if I wasn't going to make a deal fast enough. So we're having very good negotiations with the people that are leading the country now. It's the third group that we've been dealing with, and they are different. And you could say it's regime change actually, because these are very different people. I find them to be more rational, very smart.
K
Kristen Welker2:37
Markets closing just moments ago, reacting to the president's threat, the Dow tumbling more than 950 points. Meanwhile, new economic numbers show inflation in May, jumping to 4.2% from a year ago, largely fueled by rising energy costs and fuel prices. As transit through the Strait of Hormuz remains disrupted. But today, the president once again downplayed those rising prices. Here's what he said.
G
Garrett Haake3:02
Are you concerned, Mr. President, about the latest inflation number which came out this morning? Could that be a headwind? I love it.
D
Donald Trump3:08
The numbers were great. When the war is over, it's coming down. It's going to come down like a rock.
K
Kristen Welker3:16
Meanwhile, a new poll shows Americans overwhelmingly disapprove of President Trump's handling of inflation, the cost of living, and the economy. Joining me now to start us off, our team of NBC News reporters: White House Correspondent Monica Alba, Senior National Security Correspondent Courtney Kube, and Business and Data Correspondent Brian Cheung. Monica, I have to start with you at the White House, as we were just discussing President Trump saying the U.S. is planning to carry out more strikes again today. What exactly can you tell us?
M
Monica Alba3:46
Yeah, I mean, this is a president who is telegraphing what he wants his military to continue to do here. We saw a little bit of a preview of that yesterday, but it's the president stressing that because of the downing of that Apache helicopter, he argues the U.S. has no real option here but to respond. The question is, how forcefully will he respond? And does this mean that this is a restarting of major combat military operations, which, remember, the president has not taken that off the table. He has said that that is possible throughout the course of this pretty shaky ceasefire, but it's unclear if that's what he means or whether these are going to be continued targeted strikes like what we have seen in recent days, because, again, even though there is technically this fragile ceasefire, the U.S. and Iran have been trading and continue to trade some of those strikes back and forth, especially over the last couple of days. So when he was asked specifically by our colleague Garrett Haake whether that did mean to resume the bombing, the president indicated yes. But again, we don't know if this is going to be the sort of start of another large barrage or continuation, but it really comes, Kristen, as the president is saying, kind of on the other hand, that he still feels a peace deal could be imminent, could be coming in the next couple of days, as he continued to stress to you in your interview as well. So where the reality exists between those two very different things is still a very open question.
K
Kristen Welker5:05
It is such a seminal point. Monica, just how close are they to getting a deal? Courtney, let me turn to you. Pick up where Monica left off because she talked about this open question. Could this be a large barrage of attacks that we see today, or will it be similar to what happened overnight? What are you watching for and what are your sources telling you?
C
Courtney Kube5:26
So we have seen a pattern between how the U.S. and Iran have been retaliating, responding, whatever you want to say here. Over the last several weeks, the U.S. has been taking strikes primarily along the Strait of Hormuz and even inside the Strait of Hormuz, on an island in there. They hit the coastal radar sites, air defense systems. They hit the kinds of locations where the Iranians may be firing off drones or, in some cases, surface-to-air missiles, to try to stop them from doing so in the future. That's how they justify these self-defense strikes. So I would suspect that would be the same kind of thing that we would see going forward. But we don't know. We don't have any real specificity that we can say on that right now. I would suspect, though, Iran has been firing back, launching out at U.S. allies in the region, and specifically trying to target U.S. personnel on bases, whether it's U.S. bases or even bases that are owned by the host country, where U.S. personnel are sometimes housed. The majority of those have been shot down, though.
K
Kristen Welker6:19
I think a lot of people are wondering, Courtney, what we are witnessing, what happened overnight, is it already an escalation? How are people within the Pentagon viewing this?
C
Courtney Kube6:28
So the one thing that has definitely escalated is it's a shorter time frame between the escalation ladder of little activities that are occurring, and then that leads to strikes from both sides. That time frame keeps shrinking. But not just that. Iran, one difference from last night: Iran fired on three different countries. It was a large number of missiles and drones, one of the biggest ones that we've seen of the ceasefire. The U.S. struck 20 different targets as part of this yesterday. That's larger than what we've been seeing. It's usually been two or three, maybe locations. So in that way, yes, this is escalating. The way that it's not escalating, though, is exactly what Monica was just talking about, the idea of major combat operations back inside Iran. We still haven't seen it move into that area. This is still really focused on what's going on inside the Strait of Hormuz.
K
Kristen Welker7:15
Okay. Well, I know you're going to be watching it very closely. Stick around. Monica, let me just go back to you because President Trump said something else that I think got a lot of attention today. He announced what he's calling a secret mission to secure more oil. What exactly does that mean? Could it potentially bring prices down?
M
Monica Alba7:34
Yeah, that language certainly did raise a lot of eyebrows, Kristen. When the president said he was able to basically tell reporters in the world about it now, because Iran had kind of figured it out, he implied that basically some of the military assets that have been in place in this naval blockade and in the region have helped some tankers and some vessels be able to transit through the Strait of Hormuz. The president argues this has contributed to a bit of a dip in gas prices that we have seen in recent days, because, he says, it allowed 100 million barrels of oil to enter the open market. But we have some questions about exactly what this was. What he calls a secret mission maybe is actually something that we sort of did know was going on or something that certainly had been an effort behind the scenes, because we know that the administration had continued to tell us they were trying to do that to get more through, but that maybe they weren't being as public about their role in it. So this was something that was a bit of a surprise. It does seem like it perhaps could have had a little bit of an impact, but we should point out, Kristen, that those prices at the pump are still much higher than they were before the war began.
K
Kristen Welker8:39
Yeah, it's a really good point. And I'm going to come back to you on the broader economy in just a moment, Monica. But, Courtney, let me have you weigh in on this secret mission. What are your sources telling you about that?
C
Courtney Kube8:50
It's not so secret. It is true. The U.S. military, basically what we should look at this is the military is helping sort of coordinate with some of these shipping companies so that some of the ships can get not only out of the Strait of Hormuz, but back in to get more oil. There have been more than 200 transits throughout that, not necessarily 200 ships, but transits back and forth through the Strait of Hormuz over the course of the last month or so, according to a U.S. official. Basically, what the U.S. is doing here is they're saying, look, here is the safest passageway through the Strait of Hormuz. While you're going along there, stay in communication with us. If you see that you're getting any threats, attacks from drones, whatever it is, we're really, really close to you. We're right nearby. The U.S. has been shooting down incoming drones and projectiles that have been launched by the Iranians, so they are protecting commercial shipping. It's just not at the same level as Project Freedom, which lasted just a couple of days several weeks ago. It's a slightly scaled-back version of that, and it's more about coordinating than it is about actually protecting.
K
Kristen Welker9:47
All right. Courtney Kube, thank you so much for helping to start us off today and all of your great reporting, including overnight. We really appreciate it. Monica, let me turn back to you. You just talked about gas prices. You know, it was so notable because we got this new inflation figure today, which shows that it did, in fact, increase yet again. But the president is downplaying the latest inflation numbers. What exactly did he say, Monica?
M
Monica Alba10:10
Yeah. He said something that also may be seized upon by Democrats and critics in the coming months, which was, quote, 'I love the inflation' because he argues it means that when this conflict, in his view, is over, the prices will come crashing down. That's an argument we have heard the Trump administration and the White House make repeatedly when it comes to gas prices, when it comes to some of these other higher costs. But it's not something that we have seen overall, but it just sort of is an interesting point from the president, who really has leaned into this kind of trying to dismiss the idea of affordability concerns. Remember that when he was asked whether he thinks about Americans' financial situations when factored into his decision making about the war in Iran, he said, and doubled down and tripled down, that he doesn't think about it at all, that it doesn't factor into that. So this is sort of a part of the president's own view on this. But that does certainly kind of dismiss some of these concerns that we have seen that are really raised at the very top, if not the top of the list, when voters are asked what they care most about and likely will continue to be asked about as we get closer to the midterms. And those are these issues of affordability and high costs, Kristen.
K
Kristen Welker11:15
All right. Monica Alba, covering all the angles for us from the White House. Monica, thank you so much. Really appreciate it. Brian Cheung, let me turn to you now. Again, as we reported at the top of the program, we did see markets drop today. Give us your insight into why that is happening and the latest inflation report.
B
Brian Cheung11:34
Yeah, Kristen. As you can see on that screen, the markets ended the day down 1.5%, 2% in some cases. Some of that is the malaise on tech stocks. A lot of that is the Iran war developments. But also this inflation report, which showed prices rising by 4.2% between May of this year and May of last year. Not only is that higher than the 3.8% we saw in April, but it's also the highest number that we've seen on this print since April of 2023, over three years ago. Now, I think this is the more worrying thing that's certainly going to make that affordability problem that Monica just talked about even worse. And that is negative real wage growth. Again, this is basically a measure of adjusting your income for inflation, because inflation is now in its second consecutive month of being higher than the rate of wage increases. That means that Americans are likely having to tap into their savings, because the price tags at the store are rising at a faster pace than your actual income. And a lot of that is, of course, because of higher energy costs, gas prices well above $4 a gallon. It was sub-$3 a gallon before this war began, but again, up 23% compared to a year ago. Food costs are also up over 3%. So these are all things that are weighing on Americans and also going to weigh likely on the Federal Reserve, whether expectation is that they're not going to cut interest rates or move interest rates in their next meeting next week, but later on down the year, you now have markets pricing in a good chance they could hike interest rates. That would be certainly unwelcome news to the president.
K
Kristen Welker12:57
So let me follow up with you on that point, because I asked President Trump about that specifically. Is he concerned that they could, in fact, hike interest rates? He was very clear he was not a fan of that. Walk me through what the Fed is grappling with right now. And again, as you say, they're going to meet next week.
B
Brian Cheung13:12
Yeah. And Kevin Warsh is going to be in between the rock of this economy and the hard place that is the president obviously calling for lower interest rates, as he told you in that interview over the weekend. Now, again, what the Fed is going to be really focused on is right here. This particular chart on real wage growth. This is a major red flag for the economy. You do not want inflation eroding at your income for that reason. Generally, when you see this type of dynamic and inflation going up, the Federal Reserve will respond by hiking interest rates. Again, that is exactly the opposite of what the president wants. He has said and reiterated in your interview that he will be independent in terms of allowing Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh to do his thing. His first meeting is going to be next week. How does the incoming Fed chair thread that needle? I think what was also interesting, the president told you he's living with Kevin. So it does seem like he's willing to let him do his own thing. But what types of Truth Social posts can we see if the Fed chair does not lower interest rates, but even later on down the line hikes them? We'll have to see.
K
Kristen Welker14:11
Yeah, I think that's a good point. Well, Brian Cheung, thank you so much for joining us with that analysis.