President Donald Trump convened his Cabinet Wednesday for the 12th meeting of his second term, and he covered key foreign policy issues, such as Iran and Cuba, while giving Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard a grateful send-off.
Trump had announced Tuesday that the Cabinet meeting would take place at Camp David in Maryland, but he later announced that it would take place at the White House due to “possible bad weather conditions.”
1. Iran
The president addressed the ongoing negotiations with Iran, stressing that he would not agree to a partial deal. He urged more Arab countries to join the Abraham Accords to normalize relations with the state of Israel.
Both Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio emphasized that Iran cannot be allowed to obtain a nuclear weapon.
Trump contrasted his approach with that taken by former President Barack Obama, who pursued a deal with Iran that critics claim would not have prevented the country from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Trump said he had achieved a sort of double regime change in Iran.
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“It really is regime change,” he said. “You know, we didn’t set out for regime change, but the fact that we’re dealing with a totally different group of people than we were at the beginning, and frankly, I find them to be much more reasonable. I actually find them to be smarter.”
“This is regime change,” Trump added. “One regime is gone, another regime is gone, we’re dealing with the third. Pieces of it, because some of them are gone, too.”
“How can you have a stronger regime change than that?” he asked.
2. Venezuela and Cuba
When a reporter asked about Venezuela and Cuba, Trump asked Rubio to provide an update.
Rubio mentioned a three-phase process in Venezuela: “stabilization, recovery, and transition.” After the United States extricated Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, acting President Delcy Rodríguez has taken control of the country.
Since Jan. 3, more than 10 million barrels of Venezuelan oil have been delivered to the United States and sold on the global market, generating revenue that Rubio said is finally going to benefit the Venezuelan people.
“For the first time ever, the money’s not being stolen,” he said.
As for Cuba, the situation is far more dire. The island nation has been experiencing roving blackouts amid the U.S. oil embargo.
“Cuba’s in a lot of trouble,” Rubio said. “Being communist is bad, being an incompetent communist is, like, the worst.”
The secretary of state did not explain the administration’s exact plan to deal with Cuba, but he pledged, “We’ll be working on it.”
“We want something good for the Cuban people,” he said. “Having a failed state 90 miles from our shores is a threat to the national security of the United States.”
For his part, Trump celebrated that the U.S. is “producing right now more oil, by double, than Russia and Saudi Arabia combined.”
3. Thanking Tulsi
Trump also expressed his “tremendous gratitude” to Gabbard, director of the Office of National Intelligence.
He said she has “worked tirelessly to restore trust and focus … with the Intelligence Community.”
“Tulsi, we’re praying for you and for your husband,” he added. Gabbard announced last week that she would resign in order to take care of her husband, Abraham, who is struggling with bone cancer.
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