President Donald J. Trump in the Situation Room of the White House Oct. 26, 2019. He is seen monitoring developments as U.S. Special Operations forces close in on ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s compound in Syria. (Shealah Craighead/The White House via Getty Images)
Trump again held a meeting in the Situation Room Thursday morning, when he received an intelligence briefing with national security advisers, which followed a Situation Room meeting on Wednesday afternoon, another meeting on Tuesday afternoon with national security advisers and a Monday evening meeting upon his abrupt return from the G7 summit in Canada this week.
Top national security officials, including Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff, are among officials who have joined Trump in the meetings as the administration weighs the spiraling conflict.
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Kayleigh McEnany, White House Press Secretary under the first Trump administration, speaks during a White House press briefing in 2020. (Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)
"He chairs a full NSC meeting, and people review the information, update the situation, and the president can go back and forth with the advisors about asking questions, probing about the analysis, asking for more detail on something, kind of picking and choosing among the options, or suggesting new options," said Bolton, who served as Trump's national security advisor between April 2018 and September 2019.
"And out of that could well come decisions," he added.
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Then-White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany in White House breifing in 2020. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)
She continued that during the pandemic, the task force would spend hours in the Situation Room on a daily basis as the team fielded an onslaught of updates from across the country. Trump frequently received the top lines from the meetings and joined the Situation Room during key decisions amid the spread of the virus.
"When he was in there, absolutely, there's a deference," she said, referring to how the tone of the room would change upon Trump's arrival. "Yet, you had key officials who spoke up, who were not afraid to give their point of view to him. But I think there's a recognition he's the commander in chief."
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Press secretaries typically do not attend high-profile National Security Council meetings in the Situation Room, but have security clearances and can call into the room if needed, and are given updates from senior officials.
McEnany added that press secretaries wouldn't typically want to be in the room for high-stakes talks because "you don't want your head filled with these sensitive deliberations of classified information" when speaking with the media.
Then-President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and members of the national security team receive an update on the mission against Osama bin Laden in the Situation Room of the White House on May 1, 2011, in Washington. (Getty Images)
"I have a message directly from the president, and I quote: 'Based on the fact that there's a substantial chance of negotiations that may or may not take place with Iran in the near future. I will make my decision whether or not to go within the next two weeks.' That's a quote directly from the president," she said Thursday.
Israel launched pre-emptive strikes on Iran June 12 after months of attempted and stalled nuclear negotiations and subsequent heightened concern that Iran was advancing its nuclear program. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared soon afterward that the strikes were necessary to "roll back the Iranian threat to Israel's very survival."
He added that if Israel had not acted, "Iran could produce a nuclear weapon in a very short time."
Dubbed "Operation Rising Lion," the strikes targeted Iran's nuclear and missile infrastructure and killed a handful of senior Iranian military leaders.
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Then-President Joe Biden meets with members of the National Security team regarding the unfolding missile attacks on Israel from Iran, on April 13, 2024, in the White House Situation Room in Washington. (Adam Schultz/The White House via Getty Images)
Leavitt added during Thursday's briefing that Trump is the "peacemaker-in-chief," while noting that he is also not one to shy from flexing America's strength.
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"The president is always interested in a diplomatic solution to the problems in the global conflicts in this world. Again, he is a peacemaker in chief. He is the peace-through-strength president. And so, if there's a chance for diplomacy, the president's always going to grab it. But he's not afraid to use strength as well," she said.
Fox News Digital reached out to the White House for additional comment on the high-level talks but did not immediately receive a reply.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/inside-situation-room-where-trump-his-national-security-team-weighing-next-steps-iran