President Donald Trump’s surprise war in Iran has cost him the trust of the majority of Americans.
A damning CNN poll found that nearly six in 10 Americans oppose the president and Israel’s coordinated strikes on Iran, which, as of publication, have claimed the lives of at least four U.S. service members.
The survey also suggests that many voters aren’t sold on Trump’s version of how the conflict will unfold.
The president, 79, told CNN on Monday that he doesn’t expect the war he launched to drag on. “I don’t want to see it go on too long,” he insisted. “I always thought it would be four weeks. And we’re a little ahead of schedule.”
But a majority of those surveyed—56 percent—said they believe long-term military conflict between the U.S. and Iran is at least “somewhat likely.”
What’s more, 62 percent of Americans said Trump should seek congressional approval for any additional military action, and 60 percent said he lacks a clear strategy for the conflict.
Congressmen and Trump foes Thomas Massie (R-KY) and Ro Khanna (D-CA) are expected to bring forward a vote next week aimed at curbing Trump’s military action without congressional approval.
That effort did not deter the president’s major attack Saturday morning, which reportedly included a direct hit on the Shajareye Tayabeh girls’ school in Minab, Hormozgan Province, killing at least 43 students and wounding 63 others, according to the Iranian state news agency Islamic Republic News Agency.
Trump himself has acknowledged the uncertainty on the length of his war. During a brief phone interview with Axios on Saturday, he mused: “I can go long and take over the whole thing, or end it in two or three days and tell the Iranians: ‘See you again in a few years if you start rebuilding [your nuclear and missile programs].’”
The poll was conducted Saturday and Sunday, following reports that the strikes killed Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, but before news broke of Americans killed in the military action.
The survey comes after a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted in the hours after “Operation Epic Fury” found that just one in four Americans approved of the military strikes.
Even the president’s own MAGA base appears unenthused. In a January Politico poll, just half of 2024 Trump voters supported military action in Iran—leaving his administration with the task of selling them on a war he acknowledged would likely claim more American lives.
Meanwhile, Trump is already lavishing himself with praise over the ongoing attack on Iran, which, at the time of writing, has killed at least 550 people.
Trump spoke to ABC reporter Jonathan Karl on Sunday night, who said the president had become increasingly bullish.
“He told me, quote, ‘Nobody could have done this but me and you know that,’” Karl said on Good Morning America early Monday.
Karl added that Trump’s successful January kidnapping of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, without a single American life lost, left him “spoiled” and factored into failed talks between the U.S. and Iran ahead of the strikes.
“He told me that a year ago he would have accepted what the Iranians offered, but quote, ‘We have become spoiled,” Karl said.
When reached for comment, a White House official told the Daily Beast on background: “A majority of Americans support President Trump’s decisive action against a terrorist regime that has killed and maimed thousands of Americans for nearly 50 years under the evil hand of the Ayatollah. The President has always been clear that Iran, the world’s number one sponsor of terror, can never obtain a nuclear weapon, and his actions now will make America—and the world—a safer place.”
