President Donald Trump told a rally audience in Grand Island, Nebraska, that Iran could “take out” Los Angeles and San Diego, remarks that California officials and media critics are now treating as a call for an attack on American soil.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Trump made the remarks during a rambling speech in which he said gas prices would be lower soon, touted his ouster of Venezuela's dictator, and attacked news outlets. KTLA reported that Trump was discussing the war in Iran and the price of gasoline when he raised the idea of foreign powers striking California's most populated cities.
“Let 'em take out Los Angeles, let 'em take out San Diego,” Trump said, according to an account of the Nebraska speech. A separate write-up described the president as suggesting that seeing two American cities “taken out” would be a “small price to pay.”
California Governor Gavin Newsom responded early Tuesday with a post on the account @GavinNewsom, tying the remark to the recent deployment of federal troops inside his state.
“After sending the National Guard and Marines to occupy California, Donald Trump is now saying our foreign enemies should 'take out' Los Angeles and San Diego,” Newsom wrote. “He is deranged and dangerous.”
The reaction spread quickly across partisan lines on social media. The account @PalmerReport, a frequent critic of the president, went further than Newsom in a post published shortly after four in the morning Eastern time.
“Donald Trump just called on Iran to 'take out' the American cities of Los Angeles and San Diego,” the post read. “For that alone, Trump should rot in prison for the rest of his worthless miserable life.”
That post was not content to leave the remark with the president. By mid-morning, the account @emptywheel had turned it into a direct loyalty test for one of Trump's most visible media allies, addressing the query to the account @SteveHiltonx.
“Do you agree with Donald Trump that it's no big deal if Iran destroys Los Angeles or San Diego?” the post asked. “Or do you condemn Trump's attack on America and disavow his support?”
The sequence matters because it shows how a single line delivered to a friendly rally crowd became, within hours, a litmus test applied to figures outside the room. Newsom's post framed the remark as the conduct of a president willing to sacrifice American cities. The @PalmerReport post framed it as conduct deserving criminal punishment. The @emptywheel post framed it as a question every Republican officeholder and commentator would eventually have to answer.
Democratic leaders and lawmakers from California called out Trump's remarks and accused him of “inviting an attack” on U.S. soil, according to coverage of the fallout. The Los Angeles Times, KTLA and other outlets reported the Nebraska event and its aftermath.
The White House response to the backlash is unknown, and it is not yet known whether Trump has addressed the reaction to his Nebraska comments. It is likewise not known whether the figures named by critics, including the account @SteveHiltonx, have responded to the questions directed at them.
What is known is the shape the story took. A rally line about Iran and the cost of gasoline was picked up by aggregators, then by California's governor, then by commentators who used it to demand answers from the president's supporters. The underlying claim that Trump invited an attack on two American cities by a foreign power is not independently verified by Next News Network. It remains an allegation being made by the officials and accounts reacting to the Nebraska speech.
The episode lands in the middle of an already charged dispute between Washington and Sacramento. Federal troops have been sent into California, a deployment Newsom himself described in his post as an “occupation.” Against that backdrop, a remark about foreign enemies and California's two largest cities carries a weight it might not carry in calmer times, and the response reflects it.
Trump's remarks come amid a broader debate over American involvement in the war in Iran, which the president was discussing when he made the comments. He also used the speech to promise lower gas prices and to criticize news organizations, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Trump has long used rally settings to test lines before large, friendly audiences, and this one traveled further and faster than most. Within hours it had moved from the podium in Grand Island to the timeline of California's governor, and from there to a broad set of accounts pressing the case that the president had crossed a line. Whether the remark becomes a sustained line of attack or fades after a news cycle is not yet clear.
What is clear is that the criticism is coming from multiple directions: a sitting governor, a national commentator, and a pair of social media accounts that have spent years opposing the president. Each is using the same Nebraska line, and each is demanding that others answer for it.
Next News Network could not independently verify that Trump called on Iran to strike Los Angeles and San Diego.
Our Take
The line from Nebraska is ugly, and the reaction to it is instructive. However the president meant it — and the White House has not said — the plain reading of “let 'em take out Los Angeles, let 'em take out San Diego” is a president talking about American cities the way a talk-radio host talks about congressional districts.
The rush to weaponize the remark, though, deserves scrutiny too. Within hours, a single sentence became a loyalty oath demanded of a media commentator who had nothing to do with the speech. That is not accountability. It is a pile-on looking for a target, and it treats a serious question — what does the commander in chief actually believe about the safety of two American cities — as another round of gotcha.
Californians deserve a real answer about the president's intentions and about the federal deployment inside their state. They deserve it in plain words, from the president himself, and not in the form of a question shouted at someone else on social media. Until that answer comes, the outrage will keep doing what outrage does: business as usual.
