Fox News Grills Trump on Who Exactly He’s Talking to in Iran

Even Fox News is confused as to who exactly President Trump has been negotiating with in Iran. 

President Trump claimed this week that he’s talking to Iran “right now,” but Iran’s foreign ministry has fervently denied that claim, saying it’s not interested in direct negotiations. When asked about the contradiction on Fox News Tuesday, Trump struggled to explain.

“We hear that you’re talking right now with leaders on Iran,” Fox News’s Brian Kilmeade said. “But Iran has come out publicly and said ‘we’re not talking to the U.S.—”

“Well, they just came out and said ‘we are talking’ a little while ago,” Trump interrupted. 

“So could you tell me who you’re talking to, Mr. President?” 

“For some reason, we can be in the midst of a beautiful discussion, and they’ll come out and say ‘we’re not talking’ or ‘we didn’t discuss nuclear.’ Well, that’s all we discussed, because they’ll never have a nuclear weapon, they understand that,” Trump said, avoiding answering the direct question. “We’ve had some very good talks.” 

He then went on to change the subject entirely, instead discussing recently deceased Senator Lindsey Graham’s insistence upon an Iran deal—surprising if true, given the late senator’s violent, hawkish approach to foreign policy. 

“He was very much a hawk …[even] he was somebody that said it was a good time to make a deal.... Lindsey liked war, to be honest with you.”  

It does not inspire confidence when the president can’t confidently say who he has been in contact with while supposedly trying to negotiate an end to his increasingly unpopular and expensive war. This conversation came after a recent pause in violence in the region, and ahead of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to the White House on Tuesday—in which he most likely lobbied Trump to start bombing Iran again. 
KILMEADE: We hear that you're talking with leaders from Iran. But Iran has come out publicly and said 'we're not talking to the US'

TRUMP: Well, they just came out and said we are talking

KILMEADE: So could you tell me who you're talking to?

TRUMP: We've had some very good… pic.twitter.com/bAqKISTbjU
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 28, 2026 ...