Donald Trump’s claim that a former U.S. president privately told him they backed his war in Iran has been denied by all four living past presidents.
Trump, 79, made the claim about a mysterious former president confiding in him no less than three times on Monday.
“For 47 years, no president was willing to do what I’m doing,“ Trump said in the White House, speaking about launching his war on Iran that has so far seen 13 American service members killed and over 200 injured or wounded.
Another 168 people, including 100 children, were killed after a drone strike on a girls’ school in Iran on the first day of the war.
The conflict has also led to soaring global energy prices as oil supplies have been constricted by disruptions to the Strait of Hormuz.
“I’ve spoken to a certain president, who I like, actually,” Trump claimed. “A past president, former president. He said, ‘I wish I did it. I wish I did’. But they didn’t do it. I’m doing it, yeah.”
When pressed on which former president, Trump said, “I can’t tell you that. I don’t want to embarrass him. It would be very bad for his career, even though he’s got no career.”
Later, in the Oval Office, the aging president, whose cognitive skills and memory have been questioned, then circled back to the same topic.
“Other presidents should have done...” Trump said, not finishing his sentence about starting the brutal war with Iran.
“I spoke to one of the former presidents who I actually like,” he continued. “I actually speak to some, I do like some people, it’d be shocking. And he said, ‘I wish I did what you did.’ Could’ve done it. Other presidents, somebody should’ve done it. Forty-seven years this went on.”
Fox News reporter Peter Doocy then asked Trump directly who exactly it was.
“Was it George W. Bush?”
Trump replied, “No.”
When asked if it was Bill Clinton, Trump looked down and said, “I don’t want to say. I don’t want to say.”
He then added the unnamed president is “a member of a party, they have Trump Derangement Syndrome... it’s somebody that happens to like me and I like... that person is a smart person.”
Trump continued, “But that person said ‘I wish I did it,’ OK? But I don’t want to get into who. I don’t want to get him into trouble.”
When Doocy asked if he could guess, Trump said, “Yeah I think you probably know,” adding, “Maybe he’d even be proud?”
Bill Clinton, 79, George W. Bush, 79, Barack Obama, 64, and Joe Biden, 83, are the only four former presidents still alive.
In a statement to the Daily Beast, a spokesperson for Clinton said he had not spoken to Trump about the war.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House as well as reps for Bush, Obama, and Biden. Aides for the three echoed those sentiments to CNN, “saying there is no record of any communications with Trump,” according to its report. The Associated Press also confirmed with representatives of the four former presidents that they had not spoken with Trump recently.
Trump has been more positive about Clinton than other Democratic former presidents Biden and Obama.
In February, Trump even expressed sympathy for Clinton ahead of a House Oversight Committee probe into his relationship with late child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Both Trump and Clinton have appeared in the Epstein files, with both men denying any knowledge of the disgraced financier’s crimes.
“I don’t like seeing him deposed,” Trump said of Clinton. “But they certainly went after me a lot more than that.”
When photos of Clinton, as well as Trump, appeared in the latest dump of documents from the Epstein files last December, the Republican again spoke fondly of the former president.
“I like Bill Clinton,” Trump said. “I’ve always gotten along with Bill Clinton; I’ve been nice to him, he’s been nice to me … I hate to see photos come out of him but this is what the Democrats – mostly Democrats and a couple of bad Republicans – are asking for, so they’re giving their photos of me too.”
