get the dog back. >> harris: look at the woman in the video, it's breathtaking. >> that's dedication but also point out this is in los angeles, i believe. so, this is going to happen again and again and again whether it's a dog or an item or a purse because when you have lawless l.a., people steal and take whatever they want, no repercussions for it. and those french bulldogs, people will probably not steal your mutt. >> kayleigh: a lot of love but i will say, i didn't know people stole pets like this. apparently french bulldogs are being targeted over and over. >> emily: lady gaga's dog was stolen. >> kayleigh: this specific breed. >> harris: our hearts are with you over duchess. duchess had a good mom. thank you for watching, everybody. when you can't watch in person, dvr the show. "america reports" now. >> made it clear, made it clear

iranians, be careful. warning if they move against the troops we had respond and they should be prepared. i've delivered the message to iran, they know not to do anything. iran does not want a war with us. >> john: expecting to hear from the white house and the pentagon shortly for the first time since an iranian-backed terror group turned deadly for american soldiers. hello, john roberts in washington and so begins another week on a tragic note. >> sandra: good to be with you. sandra smith in new york. this is "america reports". u.s. official telling fox news the iranian proxy drone was able to slip past the u.s. air defenses because it was mistaken for an american drone scheduled to return to the base at the same time. that strike killed three soldiers and wounded dozens

more. >> john: axios reporting the president is discussing a significant military response, and some republicans demand biden hit back harder and more directly by striking targets inside iran. >> sandra: nikki haley wants the biden administration to be more aggressive and do more. she is here to react in moments. but first, jacqui heinrich is live at the white house for us. moments ago the white house said president biden has been in the situation room today. what are we learning is coming from that? >> sandra, with the deaths of the three american soldiers it's clear president biden's warning to iran "don't" didn't work, and now the white house is promising to hit back. >> there will be a response. this was a consequential attack, no question about it and our thoughts and prayers go to the families at the worst possible news over the weekend, so he's going to take that very, very seriously. he'll make the right decision. >> the president met with his

national security team including the secretary of defense lloyd austin, back at the pentagon after his secret hospitalization for prostate cancer care treatment. they say this time the punch back has to be different. no more targeting weapons storage warehouses, but pushing to go after targets inside iran itself. senator john cornyn telling biden to target tehran, lindsey graham saying hit iran now, hit them hard. a number of republicans say biden bears responsibility for this because his previous responses to the more than 160 proxy attacks on american forces since october were not strong enough. >> when you are trying to play defense constantly, rather than punching back in a meaningful way, this blood is on this administration's hands, period. and they need to take responsibility for it. bigger picture, we are shooting down 30, $40,000 drones with 2 to $3 million missiles.

this is -- it's not sustainable. >> congressional democrats have seemed to back the deliberate proportional response but they would like congressional approval, including one republican senator, mike lee. sandra. >> sandra: keep us posted live at the white house, thank you. john. >> john: some thoughts on all of this from republican presidential candidate nikki haley. governor, thank you so much for joining with us today. i want to play a little more of what john kirby had to say in the wake of this latest attack earlier. listen here. >> i certainly can't deny the fact there have been a series of attacks now increasingly lethal over weeks and months, which is why the president is going to be reviewing what the appropriate response is going forward. we don't want to see these attacks continue. and we want to make it clear that they are unacceptable. >> john: the president was warned time and time again by a lot of people on this network

that this was going to happen. what needs to happen you no, governor. >> a series of attacks, 160 strikes. i mean as a military spouse, what we fear when our loved ones are oversees that something like this happens. this is not about hitting iran hard. this is about hitting iran smart. it's making sure, i don't know what biden is waiting on. he has got to strengthenings is as. when he loosened them, he allowed billions of dollars from china to go into iran. you've got to take away the money from iran because that takes away the money from the proxies. the first thing they need to do. the second thing they need to do, go and take out any of the production sites that are allowing them to do this in iraq and syria, that they are coming from, and the third thing, you have to figure out which iranian leaders are making the decisions and you take them out. this isn't about hitting iran, this is strategic and smart about what you do take out. when you do that, you are taking

away their capabilities of hurting more american soldiers. >> sandra: do you fear how that could lead to dramatic escalation here? >> if you randomly hit iran, that would lead to dramatic escalation. if you smartly hit iran, you go and going after their capabilities to hurt you further. iran knows they cannot defeat america. they know that they don't want to take that on. the problem is they smell blood in the water. smell weakness, they are doing what they can because they can. but until you take their money away, you are continuing to pay for them to injure and kill american soldiers. that's the part biden needs to understand. he's actually giving them the money to do it. >> john: in the reagan administration, the president hit a couple of oil platforms that were being used by the islamic revolutionary guard corps. president trump took out soleimani. is that the sort of retaliation, the sort of strike you believe president biden needs to launch?

>> he needs to go after the islamic revolutionary guard corps, after the leadership there, those making the decisions. that leaves them flatfooted. find 1 or 2 of them making the decision, it will chill all of them when you do that. they didn't necessarily care if you take out all of their equipment and weapons, don't care if you take out the proxies fighters, they'll add new ones to them. what they do care about is if you touch their money or leadership, that gets iran's attention. >> sandra: do you worry positioning with what happens in the u.s. and your run for the white house, do you fear what message this sends to voters about us getting more and more involved in the world's problems. looking at our fox news voter analysis, did not show an appetite among american voters to increase our role in solving the world's problems. what do you tell voters about how far you would be willing to

go to hit iran smartly as you said? >> the goal is we don't want to get into any wars, conflicts we don't need to. it's always about preventing further war. the wife of a combat veteran, we don't want our loved ones to go overseas or to fight. do everything to prevent. biden has done the total opposite. he's been weak. we saw it with afghanistan, weak on ukraine, weak with israel, now he's being weak with all of these proxies. you have to be smart, not weak. and that's the only reason, why we are so worried about donald trump. he's surrounded by chaos. he's surrounded by distractions. surrounded by temper tantrums. look at the fact both trump and biden, they are distracted by their investigations, distracted by their egos, about everything that is all about them. they need to be dealing with how to protect americans, how to keep national security strong, how to focus on that. and both of them have shown they

don't have the focus, they don't have the will to focus on something like this for eight years because that's what it's going to take to make sure we protect america. >> john: governor, on the subject of your opponent, point out four weeks now until that all important south carolina primary, you are taking some new fire from donald trump's campaign and supporters for what you said about the e. jean carroll case on meet the press, the president was found liable in the case, a jury awarded her $83.3 million. here is what you said when asked about it. >> i absolutely trust the jury and i think that they made their decision based on the evidence. >> john: so the "new york times" wrote an article around that, in which it said in part, four weeks before what could be the decisive republican primary in south carolina miss haley is trying to navigate extremely narrow and treacherous path. finding a way to diminish without turning conservative voters against her the way they have destroyed other trump

critics. how do you navigate that path? >> it cracks me up people try to overanalyze. i tell the truth as i see it. i think there have been politics played with prosecutors that have brought on some of these cases. i think politics played even with the judges. but i do think american juries still get it right. they listen to the evidence. they make the decision based on the evidence and i do still trust any american that sits on a jury i trust that they are making the right decision. but this goes to a bigger thing, john. we have a whole another year of this. so, what we watched was donald trump throw a temper tantrum the night of the new hampshire primary because 43% of republicans didn't vote for him. then i see him throw a temper tantrum in the courtroom. the reality is, are we going to have a country in disarray and a world on fire and deal with more temper tantrums? you've got two guys in their 80s so focused on their own -- the personalities and the attention that they get, that when is the

last time you heard donald trump talk about the american people? when has he talked about the fact he owes it to us to know why did he put us $8 trillion in debt in just four years. you can't say covid, because one out of every $7 was spent fraudulently. why did he praise china's president xi a dozen times after china gave us -- after china gave us covid. why is he now proposing a 10% tariff increase that's going to raise taxes on every american family. middle america pays $2,600 more because of what trump is now proposing. you can't go and add more taxes to the american people in a time we are trying to climb out of it. >> sandra: which is why all the -- south carolina, ask you what you plan to do to close the gap there and plan to persuade more gop base to back you. i was digging through the fox news voter analysis and some data points we learned on the

evening of new hampshire, you clearly won political moderates, 25 points, to donald trump's 36. among the very conservatives, and what your plan is to attract more of them to you. trump ran up the score among very conservatives by 67 points. ok, those without a college degree, 65% supported donald trump, 33% you. among rural voters, while you did win with suburban voters by one point, among rural voters, donald trump 57%, you 41%. how do you plan to win more of the gop base overcome south carolina? >> i think you know, they know i was a tea party governor. i think they know i passed voter i.d. and you know, ethics reform and making legislators vote on the record and disclose their income and do those things. so my record in south carolina is strong. but this is about freedom. the fact that we need to have more freedom, we need to have fiscal, we need to have financial freedom, we need to have freedom from government, we

need to move forward with that and what you are seeing is donald trump is trying to control more. that's what worries me. he's -- we saw this during covid. he controlled the fact what we could do, how we could do it. now he's going and proposing this tax on all american goods from baby strollers to appliances. that's taking away our financial freedom. he's trying to get more and more control and he's causing more drama and chaos in the process. that's what south carolina does not want, what americans don't want. we are getting further and further away from freedom and more in part where there is government control, or control of the party, or control of what's happening. that's taking us in the wrong direction. america has a chance to get this right. it's not about liking donald trump. i have no personal issues with donald trump. i voted for him twice. this is about do you really think this is where we need to go for the next eight years, which technically will be two years and then a lame duck. is this really where we want to go. because we are going in the

wrong direction and guess who is noticing, russia, china and iran are noticing the fact we are falling further away from freedom, further away from democracy, more in terms of government control, and we are becoming more like them. we can't let that happen. this is not a time for tax increases, this is not the time to get rid of the freedoms we have, it's the time to lean into it. >> sandra: all right. >> john: governor, four weeks until the primary, you are down by 30 points. but the 49ers were down 17 at the half and they won. >> and i gained 25 points in new hampshire in the last three weeks. stay tuned. we are not worried. >> john: they went 27 for the win, we'll watch closely. >> sandra: thanks for joining us. on to this. nypd stopping a potential terror attack before it began. two brothers are facing 130 criminal charges after a stache of weapons discovered in their apartment. bryan, what exactly did the officers find?

>> sandra, good afternoon. inside that new york city apartment in astoria, queens, andrew and angelo had notebooks full of anti-government propaganda, charles manson references as well as a hit list of cops, judges, politicians, and celebrities. police also found an arsenal of homemade guns and bombs, including eight functional improvised explosive devices, body armor, 600 rounds of ammo, smoke bombs, 3d printer, made six ghost guns, including two homemade assault weapons with homemade high capacity magazines. the inspector of the ghost gun division told us they have taken 400 ghost guns off the streets, that's up ten fold since 2019. she says ghost gun investigations can help stop

so-called lone wolf attacks. >> right now we are seeing it across the spectrum so on the foreign terrorist organization side, we had some significant takedowns in europe over the last several weeks. on the domestic side as well. and one thing that's really important to point out is it's hard to distinguish what's foreign, what's domestic. what's different about the last few months is that we are dealing with an everywhere all at once kind of a threat. >> i'm sorry, that was the deputy commissioner of intelligence and counter terrorism we also spoke to and she does talk about that we need to stop the potential of lone wolf attacks from foreign and domestic threats is the highest priority. >> it is absolutely true that october 7th has reinvigorated our terrorism threat in a pronounced way and we are not going to wait for specific chatter. we have done a lot of protective

deployments around the city based on intelligence, based on what's the sensitive location of the moment to do what we refer to as target hardening. >> the brothers face 130 counts of criminal possession of weapons, no terrorism charges but the investigation is ongoing. no indication that they are part of a terrorist organization as of yet, sandra. >> sandra: bryan, thank you. john. >> john: moments away until the white house briefs for the first time since three u.s. soldiers were killed in a drone attack in jordan. how will the u.s. respond? plus this. >> right now is a time for us to hold them accountable, to the promises they made in 2020. when they said the arab american community, muslim american community will have an seat at the table. we don't that right now. >> sandra: president biden facing make or break in michigan.

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>> sandra: michigan was one of the battle grounds that helped propel joe biden to victory in 2020, but a repeat in 2024 looks in clear after arab american community leaders turned down a meeting with bide's campaign manager, urging supporters to stop supporting him over his response to the israel-hamas war. michigan democratic congresswoman debbie dingell. great to have you here today. why are more and more arab americans furious over joe biden's israel stance? what's happening here? >> it's good to see you. and you need to understand what is happening in this community. many of them have families that are in gaza and the west bank, many of them had family that have died.

i've got more casework than you can imagine trying to get people out who have visas that they can get out, they don't have food, don't have water, don't have access to healthcare and they are worried and they want to know their voices are being heard. >> john: and they are calling for a ceasefire as well. abdallah, the dearborn mayor said this about sending campaign officials there to talk to folks from the arab american community, a little bit of advice. if you plan on sending campaign officials, don't do it on the same day you announce selling fighter jets to the tyrants murdering our family members and a state representative said this in a statement, it's unrealistic to expect that political conversations will resecure support for the president when only a ceasefire can open that

will do. >> what hamas did was a terrorist attack. 85% of the people in gaza have no home. i know the mayor and the rep very well. i've talked to them. and by the way, this trip was planned before that event happened and should be listening to. i talk to him almost -- several times a week and he has strong feelings and one of the young leaders. he did go to the white house, a candid talk with senior officials there. i know they are listening but people are worried about what's happening to their families and what's happening in the mideast. everybody should be worried about what's happening, and the white house has got to show them they are hearing them. >> sandra: turned town a meeting with the campaign manager? >> there were meetings. i'm not going to get into the nitty gritty. i think this particular meeting

took on a life of its own as people were clear and sending a message, some very direct and candid conversations. >> john: it's having an effect on the president's fortunes, donald trump eight points ahead, 47% to 39%. still a long way away from the election. that's a warning sign there. you and i were talking during the break that there's a danger that a lot of arab americans and maybe other voters in michigan may just not vote the top of the ticket this time around. >> let me be really clear. i have told everybody michigan is a purple state. people say blue, it's not, it's purple. and polls are showing how ahead hillary clinton was back in 2016 and i was telling everybody donald trump could win and then i moved as you know he's going to win and nobody believed me. it's early, there's a lot of work that has to be done. i know what the work is we have to get done and we have to roll

up or sleeves and get it done. he got a very important endorsement from the uaw, now we have to get into the halls. the president of the uaw is making it clear what the differences are between the two candidates and who fights for the workers and who doesn't. have to get out and communicate that and make sure the workers in these units also know. >> sandra: are the muslim leaders going to come around, they are vowing to ditch him in 2024. something the white house will do to turn this moment around in michigan? >> people are worried are we going to see peace in the mideast, is the war going to expand, i don't think the community will talk to the white house until there is a ceasefire. >> john: the uaw we talked about this as well, union leadership can give all the endorsement it wants to president biden but the rank and file are the ones casting the votes and increasingly working class

americans are gravitating toward the republican party. >> but that's why you've got to go out and do the contrast. donald trump has never fought -- he's never fought for the uaw members to get a salary raise. never fought for them to get healthcare. he understood very well and democrats did a terrible job in 2015, 2016 talking about the trade issue. he understood the anxiety of seeing the jobs shipped overseas but joe biden has heard them, fought for them, and delivered for them. donald trump has not. and i think it was made very clear. >> sandra: appreciate you joining us today. >> john: great to see you. awaiting a white house briefing as pressure mounts on president biden to act after three u.s. soldiers are killed by iranian proxy fighters. >> sandra: looking for an update from there, and expecting questions on the border crisis as a house panel releases draft articles on impeachment against dhs secretary mayorkas. we'll ask brandon judd whether

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>> john: house republicans stepping up their efforts to hold the administration accountable for the chaos at the southern border. a house committee releasing two articles of impeachment against homeland security mayorkas over the weekend. speaker mike johnson tends to hold a house wide vote as soon as possible. brandon judd, good to see you. what mark green said about forwarding the articles of impeachment. he said having exhausted all other options to hold secretary mayorkas accountable, it's clear congress must exercise constitutional duty and impeach him. green, johnson, believe they have the votes to pass this in the house. might be able to have a trial or at least put forward the

articles of impeachment and in the senate it will die and president will not fire him. is it worth it? >> i believe it's worth it and believe chairman green is correct. they do have the evidence on their side to show that he is not enforcing our laws and that's what he is required to do, if he doesn't enforce the laws, he's complicit with the cartels and allowing everything that we are seeing on the border to happen. and for those reasons he should be impeached. because he's not convicted by the senate, we know that, it's politics. the senate will not convict him, if they did that, the democrats would be saying joe biden is complicit in everything happening. they have no choice but to impeach him, let the senate not convict him and show it's politics. what we are doing right now is not enforcing our laws. we are allowing the cartels to

have control of our border. >> john: this came up at the white house briefing on friday, what the press secretary said in response. >> it is shameful that's how they want to use their time to, you know, wasteful time to try to impeach secretary mayorkas. i think it is shameful and what they should do, should do, the premise of your question, is work with us, work with democrats, with republicans, you know. work with the senators who are actually trying to do something to find a solution. >> john: is it shameful in your mind what the republicans are doing, and secondly, the idea of working on a solution, a lot of people would say the white house has all of the solution it needs right there in the president's executive pen. >> yeah, so i'm so sick and tired of hearing her rhetoric, sick and tired are her not having the honest conversation with the american people, not giving them the fact to make informed decisions. it's not shameful. what our government is supposed to do is hold people accountable

that are not doing their job and it is clear that this administration is not doing what is necessary on the border, and going to that point, i would love to see legislation and i'm sure that what langeford and everybody is working on will be beneficial to the border. this administration through executive action could do what is necessary to secure the border today if they wanted to. they just don't want to because the political litmus does not allow them to do that. look at the arab americans and potentially not showing up to vote, if he were to secure the border through executive action, all of that base of support that wants open borders, they are not going to show up for election. he's between a rock and a hard place. he cannot do executive action. he wants congress to do it because then he can throw his hands in the air and tell the open border base it was not me, it was congress that did this. >> john: quick answer if i could, where do you come down over the state of texas and

federal government and shelby park. >> we are supportive of governor abbott. what he's doing has been able to allow us to deploy resources to better locations. >> great. thanks, always great to catch up with you. >> sandra: bad enough when advertisers try to get their hands on your browsing history, are the feds doing that too? new reaction from jason chaffetz next. >> john: how do they know. and literally clinging to life. a woman in los angeles holding on to the hood of a speeding car. wait until you find out why. break down the latest examples of america's nonstop crime crisis. out of control. get a newday 100 va cash out loan at lower mortgage rates to pay off those high rate car loans.

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>> john: stunning admission by a top intelligence official. provided documents to a u.s. senator that show the national security agency has been buying americans' internet browsing data and doing it without warrants. jason chaffetz will tell us why it may be the tip of a very big iceberg. but first, david spunt joins us with details. how are they getting away with it? >> if the government wanted to go to communications companies to get this information from americans' searches they would need a warrant. now they are buying it from private vendors. learning this thanks to documents made public by oregon senator ron widen who wrote the director of national intelligence over concerns the nsa is buying logs of internet activities from commercial data brokers, again, john, without a warrant. widen made public letters that

confirm such practices. the exact nature of the searches not clear, but certain logs are purchased by the nsa in a letter from the pentagon dated december 11th of last year. says dod components to include defense intelligence components buy commercial data associated with electronic devices used outside and possibly inside the united states to conduct lawful dod missions such as intelligence, personnel, security, and cybersecurity. widen is calling on intelligence officials to stop doing so without the knowledge and consent of the individuals. in his letter to the director of national intelligence last week, he wrote in part that data brokers that buy and resell this data are not known to consumers and several of these companies refused to answer questions from congress regarding the companies they buy data from and the government agencies they sell it to. we reached out to the nsa for clarification, but we have yet to hear back specifically on our

questions, john. >> john: that's all kind of scary stuff and finding new ways to do this, don't they. >> yep, around warrants, by buying it. >> john: great eye opening report. thank you. >> sandra: eye opening for sure. jason chaffetz, there is obviously huge concern about this. where do your concerns lie? >> i worked with senator widen when i was on congress as chairman of the oversight committee. fbi is collecting the data when you get your driver's license, they are gathering that information. the question is the commercial data brokers, you can take any telephone number in the country, put a geo fence around it and buy it, you can track somebody 24/7. it's not just the nsa or the department of justice but organizations like the irs and

others. irs were spending $250,000 to buy some machines to actually go track people from airplanes and other things, finding out everybody's telephone number in a certain proximity. the irs, really? why? if you are a suspicion list american you have not committed a crime or under suspicion, why is the government buying data and gets around. >> sandra: the senator's letter -- we are going to the white house briefing, john kirby is taking the microphone. >> as well as everywhere in the administration send condolences to those killed. no blue star ever wants to become a gold star family. and three more on the rosters. it's hard to imagine the grief they feel now and rest of their lives. we will make sure they get the support they need and mourn with them. and wish a complete recovery for

those wounded. they will receive the best medical care the military can provide. second, the traps were conducting a vital mission, aimed to counter isis. even as the defense department gathers more information about the attack, the mission must and will continue. third, the counter isis mission is separate and distinct, indeed long standing and unrelated to our efforts to support israel and to prevent a wider conflict in the region. we do not seek another war, do not seek to escalate. but we will absolutely do what is required to protect ourselves to continue that mission and to respond appropriately to these attacks. now i know the first set of questions i'm going to get are -- what does that look like, what's appropriate, and what response options is the president considering. i hope you can understand why i'm not going to telegraph any punches from the podium nor in front of the president or his

decision-making. he's met twice with his national security team, yesterday and today. he's weighing the options before him. as he said yesterday, we will respond. we'll do that on our schedule, in our time, and we'll do it in a manner of the president's choosing as commander in chief. we'll also do it fully cognizant of the fact that these groups backed by tehran have just taken the lives of american troops. and i think i'll leave it there. quickly on one other topic, over the weekend -- sorry, over the weekend national security adviser jack sullivan held more than 12 hours of meetings in bangkok with his counterpart with the peoples republic of china. took stock on the meetings between president biden and president xi in november, and resume military to military communication which has occurred, addressing artificial intelligence safety and risks,

and advancing bilateral counter narcotics cooperation. the launch of a working group will begin tomorrow in beijing. delegation led by deputy homeland security adviser. two sides also held constructive discussions on global and regional issues, including the war in ukraine, middle east, dprk, south china sea and burma. >> a couple questions, confirm the report suggests that this -- the attack drone that killed the u.s. forces was misidentified for a u.s. drone returning to that base? >> i cannot. >> can you update us, has the u.s. confirmed attribution of the attack beyond vaguely iran-backed militia. >> we are working through that right now. >> you said the president was weighing his options.

the president has not made a decision how he wants to respond? >> i won't get ahead of the president's decision-making. he met twice with the security team not long ago, when we have something to speak to, we will speak to it. >> will we hear directly from the president, will he speak to the american people of the attack and response when it happens? >> he mentioned it yesterday in south carolina. i don't have anything on his schedule to speak to but i have no doubt he'll continue to communicate with the american people about how important it is the missions continue and our troops and facilities are safe. >> and last for me, has the president directed any change to force posture in the region to protect american troops there? >> we don't talk about force posture changes and don't preannounce them when it comes to areas on the ground that are potentially under threat. i can just tell you that the president is confident the defense department under secretary austin will do what they have to do to look after force protection issues. >> john, do you expect the

president would go to dover for the dignified transfer when the americans are returned to the united states? >> i don't have anything on his schedule to speak to. >> given the fact while there are americans in harm's way frequently, it has been a while since we had this kind of an incident resulting in deaths. do you think that is a consideration of the public type of response, a range of responses the president could use, they go from, you know, military strikes to sometimes cyber, sometimes things the public cannot see. do you believe this event rises to a level where whatever the president's decision is would have a public -- we would know -- >> you mean you are going to know. again, without getting ahead of the president's decision-making i won't do that. and as i said in the opening statement, i'm not going to telegraph punches. we'll make the decisions on our own time as i said, we'll -- the president will choose for himself how he wants to respond

and as i said in the opening statement, we'll do it fully cognizant of the fact that now and just and what just happened american lives have been taken and so his decisions, whatever they are, will be informed by all of those circumstances. what that looks like and when that comes, i'm not able to say right now. >> thanks, admiral. was the strike in jordan different than what the american forces have been facing for months now. does the u.s. believe it was a deliberate attempt at escalation. >> it's fundamentally different now, we have three families that got the worst possible news, that's different. and the scope of the wounded now more than 30 injured, some seriously, that's also different. and it's possible that the number of wounded could go up as you may know, traumatic brain injury symptoms don't present right away and that's a very serious physical injury itself.

but look, it is -- this wasn't the first drone attack on an american facility in the region. there have been others. and the fact that this one had lethal consequences doesn't mean that the previous ones weren't intended by these iran-backed militias to have that same effect. this time they killed americans and wounded a lot of them. it doesn't mean they wouldn't have preferred that outcome in the past. >> official has told abc news confirming the report how the troops there had mistakely identified the drone as one of their own. can you talk about how it might have got past the defense systems? >> i'm going to let the defense department talk about the forensics on this. i'm sure they are picking it apart and trying to figure out how it happened and it would be inappropriate to get ahead of that. >> you didn't rule out a

strike -- can you just talk about the array of options in front of the president and for instance could this be in phases, could we see a smaller scale, and then larger scale later on, what is the -- >> no, i'm not going to do that. i tried to take it out of consideration in the opening statement. i'm not going to talk about that right now. >> do you think it could affect the ongoing ceasefire negotiation to release more hostages. >> no reason for that to have an impact on the ability to try to get the hostages released and as i said last week, so i can say today, those discussions are ongoing. we believe they have been constructive and are moving in a good direction. don't want to sound sanguine here, we don't have an imminent deal to speak to, but based on the discussions over the weekend and recent days, moving in a well direction. >> how does the president balance a desire to not see

escalation in the region with a decision to respond? >> that's the hard part of it, isn't it, jeff. what being commander in chief is all about, is acting in accordance with our national security interests. what's unacceptable to those interests and what has to be done to protect those interests. there's no easy answer here. and that's why the president is meeting with his national security team, weighing the options before him. he'll do that as he's done in the past in a very careful, deliberate way so our national security interests are best preserved. >> has the president -- has the administration communicated via third party to iran the message you are seeing on tv about not wanting to have escalation. >> i am not aware as you and i are speaking that there's been a private message relayed to readers in iran. we have done that in the past. but as you and i speaking right now, i'm not aware of a

mechanism. >> on the hostages, can you give us an update on the latest there and what you expect in terms of a ceasefire and -- >> again, the discussions have been pretty constructive. and i want to be careful here because don't want to say anything that would torpedo the deal we are trying to put in place. but what we are trying to work on is another humanitarian pause of sufficient duration that will allow a large number of hostages to get released. and as you've seen in the past when we did in november, you have to have a pause in the fighting to get them safely out. so that's what we are aiming at. and of course, if you get that period of time, whatever that ends up being, then you can take advantage of it to get more humanitarian assistance and certainly when there's a pause in the fighting that means there will be a reduction in civilian casualties, which is also a goal

of ours. >> admiral, can you confirm, is the president currently actively considering potential attacks inside iran? >> we are not looking for a war with iran. we are not seeking a conflict with the regime in a military way and as i said in the opening, we are not looking to escalate here. this attack over the weekend was escalation, and requires a response. i will not get ahead of the president's decision-making. >> you are not saying whether striking in iran -- >> we are not looking for a war with iran, m.j. >> and the assessment a number of months is iran does not want a direct war with the u.s. either. does yesterday change that assessment? >> i'm not at liberty to discuss or to speculate about what the supreme leader wants or doesn't

want. clearly these attacks continue and now they have had lethal consequences. we know these groups are supported by iran, make no mistake about that. we know that. and this administration has taken action in the past to hold them accountable and taken action to hold iran accountable, for a range of destabilizing activities. issued more 500 sanctions since we came into office as well as changing our force posture in the middle east appropriately. so -- we'll continue to look at the options available to us. >> is it clear to you now whether the attack yesterday was at iran's direct urging or if this was more a proxy group that was mostly acting on its own? >> i'm not going to talk about intelligence issues. we know iran supports these groups. the degree to which they order and direct is something that intelligence analysts will look at. we know they support them, they resource them, they train them,

we know they are certainly not discouraging these attacks. whether it's attacks by the houthis, what hamas about on the 7th of october, what hezbollah is proven capable of doing and now militia groups continue to do in places like iraq and syria and now jordan. >> one last one on the unrwa controversy. israel says they have information about 13 employees connected to the october 7th attack. do you have any reason to believe that that might have been more widespread, that there could be information that later indicates that it was beyond those 13 people? >> i haven't seen any information that affirmatively makes that case. that it's more than now 13. i think last week we were looking at a dozen. that's why an investigation is so dang important here so we can look at the scope of the problems, but you have 13,000 unrwa employees, 13,000 in gaza

alone. and let's not impune the good work of a whole agency because of the bad actions by a small number. i'm not dismissing the seriousness of the allegations against the employees and whether there are more to be found, hopefully the investigation will give us more insight. it is important, and unrwa staff and commissioner general and the u.n. secretary general last week made it clear they are taking this seriously. that's our expectation, too. it's really important this investigation be as thorough and as transparent and credible as possible and we are going to be watching real closely. >> john, can i push you a little bit more on the hostages and the linkage, the potential link between the hostages and whatever action you decide to take. one of the things you talked about since october 7th is how intertwined the region is, whether it's lebanon or hezbollah or hamas, iran, the

houthis, and the difficulty with, you know, not wanting to set fire and a spark in one place that then, you know, goes all around the region. so, what gives you any confidence that if you guys are close to a deal on the hostages, and then the president orders a strike, that that deal doesn't fall apart as a result of outrage and anger in the region at the actions of the united states and how does the president, you know, how does the president make that calculation given, you know, six americans still in gaza and the other hostages and everything else. >> i didn't say we were confident, mike. we -- we are mindful of the way some actors in the region are trying to make connections across the region.

what i said was there's no reason why our work on a hostage deal needs to be affected or impacted by what happened over the weekend or what we do about what happened over the weekend. and we will respond. we still want to keep the work going, our shoulder to the wheel on this hostage deal and we'll have to see where it goes. i also want to repeat what i said earlier, we are not overly sanguine here, not cocky, we understand there is a lot of hard work ahead and that work ahead of us diplomatically certainly might be affected by events elsewhere in the region, not just what happened in jordan and what might come as a result of that. but no reason why it should and that's why we will stay at that task. >> thanks, kirby. given -- does the white house acknowledge the previous retaliatory strikes it has taken in the region have been ineffective at protectin