ICYMI—Hagerty Joins Fox & Friends on Fox News to Discuss Iran’s Economic Crisis, US-China Talks

NEW YORK-On Friday, United States Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN), a member of the Senate Banking and Foreign Relations Committees and former U.S. Ambassador to Japan, joined Fox & Friends on Fox News to discuss Secretary of War Pete Hegseth's clash with Senate Democrats, the latest on the conflicts in Iran and Ukraine, and President Trump's upcoming visit to China.

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Partial Transcript

Hagerty on Hegseth's committee dispute with Senate Democrats: "It's as if you're listening to someone from the Ayatollah [Mojtaba Khamenei]'s own cabinet speak when you hear the Democrat side make these accusations. It's as if they're trying to talk the economy into the tank, and they're trying to talk the American public into thinking this is some sort of vast defeat when that is absolutely not the case."

Hagerty on further military intervention in Iran: "The options are considerable, and if you think about the authority that we have right now in the region-the carrier strike groups that are there-we are fully armed and ready to go. Time is on our side in this one. The Iranians had an opportunity with the ceasefire. They've been in complete catastrophe, evidently, from their political navigation. But we're ready to see this come to an end. President [Donald] Trump has been very clear: There will not be a nuclear weapon, and a nuclear-armed Iran. We're not going to allow them to continue this. And we're not going to allow them to continue to hold the entire world's economy hostage either."

Hagerty on Russian involvement in Iran and the war in Ukraine: "Any sort of assistance with targeting [U.S. military bases] is an action that should never be tolerated. I think [Trump] is telling [Russia] that Iran is going to be over soon, and Russia better get in line as well. It really is amazing to see the agility of the Ukrainian army and, frankly, the toughness of the Ukrainian army."

Hagerty on the president's upcoming visit to China: "I think the tables have turned significantly in the president's favor. The Venezuelan oil that the Chinese were buying was deeply discounted on the market; it's under our control right now. I certainly think that the timeline is such that we could have the Iranian situation under control at that point, too. America will be speaking from a position of strength this time, very different from when President Trump had to go in the wake of the Biden failures and basically plead with the Chinese to ease off on the critical mineral sanctions and choke point."

Hagerty on China threatening Panamanian ships: "I think the Chinese are trying to reset the leverage as well. They also denied Meta a merger; they have blocked that because they don't want us to succeed in AI. This is a competition on global scale, and the Chinese are again trying to position [themselves] for this very meeting between [Chinese President] Xi [Jinping] and President Trump. We'll have a much better hand when we walk into that meeting this time. We need to stop every ship, and that's the goal. Ships are not moving out of the Strait of Hormuz with oil in them going to China."

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