Return to Transcripts main page
Amanpour
Interview with Former U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel; Interview with International Crisis Group Iran Project Director Ali Vaez; Interview with New York Magazine Contributor and "Know Your Enemy" Podcast Co-Host; Sam Adler-Bell. Aired 1-2p ET
Aired March 19, 2026 - 13:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[13:00:00]
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Hello, everyone, and welcome to Amanpour. Here's what's coming up.
Donald Trump threatens to massively blow-up Iran's largest gas field if attacks on Gulf energy facilities continue. Is there an off-ramp to this
escalation? Former U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel joins me. Then, Israel's assassination strategy as they knock off the Islamic Republic's
leadership. What's the reaction inside Iran, and how does the past inform the present? I ask Ali Vaez of the International Crisis Group. Plus,
journalist Sam Adler-Bell speaks to Michel Martin about the MAGA women who once were all in, but now see, quote, "cruel and fickle misogyny."
Welcome to the program, everyone. I'm Christiane Amanpour in London.
Arab and Islamic states are calling on Iran to cease attacks while affirming their right to defend themselves under international law. This
comes as the war in the Middle East is entering a new phase, a war on energy, precipitated by Israel's attack on Iran's South Pars gas field on
Wednesday, which is a crucial supply for the country. President Trump claims he knew nothing of the attack, but sources say otherwise.
After Iran hit back at Qatar's main energy hub, one of the most important gas facilities in the world, Trump put out an extraordinary post, saying
Israel would stop targeting Iran's gas infrastructure, but he also threatened to decimate the South Pars field himself if Iran hits Gulf oil
and gas facilities again.
Meantime, energy prices are soaring as the Strait of Hormuz remains virtually impassable, and oil executives are warning that this fuel crunch
could worsen.
Meantime, again, Oman's foreign minister, who brokered the recent nuclear talks, called this an unlawful war and the Trump administration's greatest
miscalculation, while U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth says, we're on plan and winning.
Chuck Hagel was a Republican senator who served as U.S. Defense Secretary under President Obama. He's also a decorated army veteran who fought in the
Vietnam War, and he's joining us now from Washington. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, welcome back to the program.
I don't know where to start. What do you think? What does your gut tell you? Do you think President Trump knew about the Israeli strike on the Pars
oil field? And -- anyway, let me ask you that first.
CHUCK HAGEL, FORMER U.S. DEFENSE SECRETARY: Well, thank you for having me on. But before I give you a direct answer on that, let me start with kind
of just setting the conversation and framing this conversation I think we're going to have.
Two weeks ago, The Economist magazine had as its cover an explosion of a ship and a blaring headline. And that blaring headline was a war without a
strategy. That pretty much sums this up. And when you're looking at a world war, essentially, that has begun, that gets more severe every day, and you
look at instability and you look at volatility as now dominating the global stage. And those are two of the greatest global threats to global
stability.
As this escalates every day, as your question just noted, with no end in sight, with no strategy, what comes next? Why are we there? What are we
doing? And the other thing here I think is really important when you look at the big picture of this and stand back.
[13:05:00]
We are seeing our allies walk away from us. Well, there's good reason for that. When President Trump, more than a year ago, started isolating America
and started dismantling the post-World War II world order, there would be consequences. Consequences would follow all that, tariffs, mocking our
allies. And so, this is but one.
I mean, we've got this now, this Middle East war that is totally inflamed, getting worse, with huge consequences now for the world, but coming. You've
got a war in Ukraine, first time since World War II, where a European nation has been invaded and we're not paying attention to that. So, we got
a lot of problems.
AMANPOUR: Let me ask you, because the Omani foreign minister who was brokering the talks, indirect talks between America and Iran, right up to
the day before the war started, has written a very open and forward-leaning and quite rare kind of article. And he is basically saying that, first of
all, he believed that a nuclear deal was possible and was on the way just before the war broke out or the Americans and the Israelis attacked Iran.
He also said that this has been America's gravest miscalculation in terms of this administration. The greatest miscalculation of all for the U.S.,
quote, "was allowing itself to be drawn into this war in the first place." And he obviously says drawn into the war by Israel. I just want to know
from you, do you agree with that assessment?
HAGEL: I do. I mean, if you start back three weeks ago when the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, was asked, uh, why did you get into this war? What
was the purpose? He gave an answer that the next day the president completely dismissed. And so, we've seen three weeks of a war now that
continues to increase in every way with no clear purpose. And I think the statements you just read is an accurate reflection of the trouble we're in
and the difficulty we're going to have to get out.
Once you start these things, just like in Vietnam, just like Afghanistan, just like Iraq, and particularly if you've got no strategy and you can't
answer questions like what comes next, starting with what was the purpose, how do you get out of this? And I don't know. I don't know what the answer
is, but it will only get worse and it will have severe consequences all over the world in every way.
And you've got the other element of this too. As we continue under President Trump to unwind the post-World War II world order, we're
isolating ourselves, the United States, where that's just increasing the supremacy of China, helping Russia, and all against our interests.
AMANPOUR: I want to play something from one of your, you know, latest successors, the current secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth. He goes out
every day and essentially -- here, listen to what he said today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PETE HEGSETH, U.S. DEFENSE SECRETARY: The media here, not all of it, but much of it, wants you to think, just 19 days into this conflict that we're
somehow spinning toward an endless abyss or a forever war or a quagmire. Nothing could be further from the truth. Nobody can deliver perfection in
wartime. This building knows that more than anyone. But report the reality. We're winning decisively and on our terms.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AMANPOUR: So, Secretary Hagel, he looked straight into the camera and he said, before he delivered that, that he wanted to talk direct to the
American people because the press was, you know, basically getting it all wrong and was against Trump and wanted Trump to fail.
So, I want to ask you, from your perspective as, and you were a Republican, as a secretary of defense, we're winning decisively on our own terms.
They'll never be spinning towards an endless abyss or forever war or a quagmire. Nothing could be further from the truth.
HAGEL: Well, I think the reality is just the opposite of what the secretary said. We continue to spin out of control. We continue to
accelerate. And again, as I said here a couple of minutes ago, where is all of this going? And as you widen the war, and you widen the war in every
way, and you continue every day to say, the Americans say, this day today is going to be the worst day for Iran. We're going to hit them harder than
we've had in the last three weeks.
[13:10:00]
Well, if that's not escalation and a forever war, I'd be interested in knowing from the president or the secretary of state, secretary of defense,
how is this going to end? When is this going to end? And it's hard to answer that, I know, because you can't even answer, why did we get in this
war? What was the purpose? We still have conflicting, depending on who you talk to, conflicting answers to that.
AMANPOUR: I just want to ask you to react to yesterday's congressional hearings with the, you know, American National Security and Intelligence
Group, you know, the DNI, CIA, I think FBI was there as well. And they contradicted the Trump administration's reasons for going to war or refused
to back up what he had said on Iran's ballistic missile threat, on Iran's imminent nuclear weapons threat. You know, they did not say that there was
an imminent threat to the United States.
HAGEL: Well, what's interesting about this too is that they are now investigating Mr. Kent, that official, but that may be just a coincidence.
Like so much of this, they like to project it is. But to answer the question, first of all, I don't have the intelligence. So, I can only speak
from my own experience in how intelligence is handled.
But from what I've seen and the people that I've talked to over the last month, no, Iran was not a threat to us. I mean, what was all this about
last year? When the United States bombed the hell out of all their nuclear facilities and the president took credit for eliminating any nuclear threat
now because we've bombed them, it's over.
So, how does that all factor into this as to the threat that was so imminent? And I just don't think from what I know and the people I've
talked to, and like Mr. Kent said, there was no imminent threat. And we were talking to them right up at the time that he started bombing them with
Israel.
AMANPOUR: Yes.
HAGEL: So, the inconsistencies here are blaring.
AMANPOUR: You mentioned Mr. Kent, that's Joe Kent. He's the former administration official who resigned saying exactly that, that Iran posed
no imminent threat to our nation.
I want to ask you also, Tulsi Gabbard, the head of DNI, said that U.S. and Israeli objectives differ. The --basically, saying that the objectives laid
out by each side are different. Do you see that as well? Because on each side they say there's no daylight between us and that we're winning and et
cetera.
HAGEL: Well, what I see there first is further confirmation of the continued inconsistency of this administration in their top officials being
able to say it the same way or at least be on the same page to answer some pretty basic questions. I mean, is our objective regime change? Is that
what we're talking about? Israel's, I don't know. I mean, Israel's now very actively involved in a war to their north in Lebanon, bombing Iran, how
much influence Israel had Mr. Netanyahu over Mr. Trump to start this war. I mean, all those are inconsistencies and unanswered questions that will come
out.
I used to tell my staff all the different jobs I had, just remember there are no secrets in the courthouse. Everything comes out and it should. But
just bottom line is the American people ought to be told the truth. They should have been told the Congress. The Congress is absent here. Why are we
doing this? I'd like to have the Congress's involvement. Constitutionally, they have a role as well. But we started this war without any of that.
AMANPOUR: Let me just also add Tulsi Gabbard of DNI testified that while the Iranian regime, and I'm going to add, and its military is largely
degraded, the government still appears to be intact.
[13:15:00]
So, I want to ask you now to reflect back to your time because the JCPOA was being negotiated, I think, while you were still in office under
President Trump. And it did -- sorry, under President Obama.
HAGEL: Under Obama.
AMANPOUR: Yes, Obama. And it was -- a lot of people who just do not trust the Iranian regime at all said, oh, it was just, you know, window dressing.
Oh, it was just a band aid. Oh, it had all these sunset clauses and would never really give you a security on the nuclear front. Just tell us now in
retrospect, what it did do and what it might've led to different to where we are now.
HAGEL: Well, I think it was hugely important. I was a strong, strong supporter of it. I think it was exactly the smart way, the right way to go
for not only Iran in our interest, but for the entire Middle East because what it did, it didn't do everything. But the first thing that that
agreement addressed was the nuclear threat of Iran. It, for the first time, gave us, the United States, our ability to put our own inspectors in Iran
with the IAEA from the United Nations, which was a huge, huge deal.
Another part of this was that we had, I think, eight nations total with the United Nations all signing off, all supporting it. Our allies, China,
Russia, all of them supported this. What it also did, it opened up Iran. Yes, it relieved them of some sanctions, but here is the important thing
for the future of Iran, for the young people of Iran who want new leadership, deserve new leadership.
This was an opportunity as it was developing and opening up their country where other countries could come in, trade with them, where you could see
things really start to develop and open up without killing each other, without the incredible destruction that's going on now. I mean, there are a
lot of other pieces to that act, but it was the smartest of all possibility.
AMANPOUR: Let me ask you finally, the idea of rules of engagement and what you've just talked about, I think the destruction of the country and what
will it mean for the future. President Trump talks about hitting Iran so hard, quote, "They'll never recover, or raining death, fire, and fury on
Iran." That's Hegseth as well. European leaders are calling foul, saying that it's reckless and illegal. That's one of the European prime ministers.
And the former French prime minister says Trump is taking the U.S. towards becoming a rogue state.
Since Secretary Hegseth has talked about, you know, I'm going to paraphrase, but useless rules of engagement, are you concerned about them
going even further off the reservation? Not just conducting a military campaign, but one that could be -- you know, could have like the whole
business of we will take no quarter, which means not saving and perhaps executing prisoners.
HAGEL: Oh, sure. I mean, this crowd does not comply with any guidelines or rules or laws. I mean, all you need to do is once again, reflect on what
the president himself said when he was asked about when the war is going to end. And his response was, well, when I say it's going to end and they,
well, how do you know that? And he said, well, I just -- my instincts will tell me when it's ready to end. Are you kidding me? No president has ever
done anything like this.
One of the things that is going to occur here and the results, consequences of what's going on is that we are manufacturing a whole new generation of
young terrorists in the Middle East. That's just one consequence of what's coming here. And I too am concerned with your question to me about
engagement and rules and international norms and how we deal with prisoners.
And now, they say they're not going to introduce ground troops three weeks ago, but now some of them, the officials are saying, the administration are
saying, well, that option is open. And we're evidently sending a Marine battalion of 2,200 Marines over into that area without any, at least I know
of what is the purpose of sending those ground troops --
AMANPOUR: Yes. Just stopping you right there, because the latest is the president in the Oval Office saying, I'm not deploying ground troops. If I
were, anyway, I wouldn't tell you. So, we don't know. It's the latest public utterance. So, we're not sure.
[13:20:00]
But anyway, Secretary Hagel, thank you very much for your perspective, your wisdom, your experience in this very dangerous time that we are in. Thank
you for joining us.
And stay with CNN because we'll be right back after the break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
AMANPOUR: Now, for the Islamic Republic, this war is existential and asymmetrical. It continues to pursue a high-risk strategy of striking the
Gulf states and disrupting the global energy supply. Their plan to cause them pain, so they pressure President Trump to end this war. Meantime,
Israel continues its assassination strategy with near daily decapitations of regime officials. One senior Iranian official told the New York Times
the mood within the regime is, quote, "one of shock and anxiety," while a senior official told me that it's energizing the base.
Ali Vaez is an Iranian-American nuclear expert who advised on the JCPOA talks in 2015. He's also Iran project director at the International Crisis
Group, and he's joining me from Geneva. Ali Vaez, welcome back to the program.
ALI VAEZ, IRAN PROJECT DIRECTOR, INTERNATIONAL CRISIS GROUP: Great to see you, Christiane.
AMANPOUR: So, very quickly, I want to start with the news today, which is the Arab states, the Gulf states have all said, stop it. And we basically
reserve our right to retaliate on you, Iran. What do you think will be the result of that from Iran?
VAEZ: Well, I don't think it's going to work with the Iranians because there is more and more evidence that some of the attacks that the U.S. has
conducted has been from either the territory of these countries or the airspaces of these countries. And Iran doesn't have a lot of other options
for externalizing the pain of this conflict.
So, I'm afraid as long as U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iranian territory will continue, Iran will also continue to attack Arab Gulf states. The way that
this can get way worse, Christiane, is that if, as we saw in the past 24 hours, that both sides would start going after each other's energy
infrastructure. If Iran is to -- it's one thing to limit the exports of energy out of this region, which can recover in a matter of days or weeks,
but if production is taken down, this might have a long-term effect, maybe months if not years, and that would be disastrous for all.
AMANPOUR: In fact, that is what a whole load of oil company executives did warn just recently. So, where do you think this is going? Because clearly
there are tactics. Israel has remarkable intelligence. It has conducted a wave of top, top, top-level assassinations. You'd think that the entire lot
was out of commission. They're not, but you heard what somebody said to the New York Times, that there's panic, that there's shock. Others say, no,
it's consolidating the base.
What do you see as the effect now of this strategy, or rather, whatever, strategy or tactics in the last three weeks?
VAEZ: So, look, I think there is an Israeli strategy and there is an American lack of strategy that we can discuss separately. Israeli strategy,
I think, is to dismantle the states in Iran by removing anyone with experience in statecraft, anyone who can engineer any kind of off-ramps.
[13:25:00]
Israel wants to ensure that this war ends with Iran becoming a failed state, Iran that is completely defanged and does not pose any challenge to
Israel's full dominance over the region. So, anything that emerges, whether it's chaos or civil strife, it's totally fine with Israel, and it can stay
in this war as long as it's required, because the majority of the cost of it is shouldered by the United States.
For the U.S., I think it's different. The U.S. went into this based on a lot of wishful thinking. I think we've ended up believing in our own
rhetoric that this government in Iran is a terrorist organization, so if it's decapitated, it would fully fold and very quickly collapse, not
realizing that this is a state. It's a very entrenched state.
It's also very deeply benched. Every commander has a replacement. Every leader has a replacement. And if we are to completely eliminate the
leadership class of the Islamic Republic, we have to be in this for several months, and this would come at a cost of completely destroying the country
at a very high civilian casualty cost, and we would create a very unstable situation the day after.
So, from what I see, the Iranian leadership is nowhere near the brink of collapse. With elimination of Larijani, now power has gravitated towards
Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf, who's the speaker of the Parliament, former commander of the IRGC's air force. And even if he is eliminated, there will
be other people standing in the line to fill his shoes.
AMANPOUR: So, then what options for off-ramps? As you've described, Foreign Minister Araghchi said on March 15th, we never asked for a
ceasefire, and we've never asked even for negotiation. The president, Pezeshkian, says any peace deal requires reparations and a guarantee the
U.S. and Israel will never attack again. Trump says Iran wants a deal, but on terms that he won't accept. And as you've pointed out, Israel doesn't
want a deal. It just wants to do the best it can to decimate the regime.
So, where do you see this headed? Is there any prospect of a negotiation? And what would that look like?
VAEZ: Look, I think it's very clear that both sides are caught in an escalation trap. President Trump could have come up with a narrative of
victory in the first week of this war. He could have said that he had killed the supreme leader, degraded Iran's military capacity, re-
obliterated its nuclear program, and walked away. But he stayed in it, and now the war is about something else. The war is about opening the Strait of
Hormuz.
And that is not possible unless the U.S. is willing to engage in a Vietnam- style massive carpet bombing of the southern shore of Iran, and potentially even then would have to put boots on the ground, either in some of the
Persian Gulf islands belonging to Iran or, again, occupy the southern shore coastline. And all of that is the definition of mission creep, will
increase the human cost of this on both sides, and would make it so much more difficult to resolve.
But it appears that the president wants some sort of a concrete achievement like that, or he has to be able to take out the stockpile of highly
enriched uranium that is missing. That, too, is a very complicated, risky mission, would put American special forces in harm's way, or he might have
to kill the new supreme leader. I feel that he needs some sort of a big, tangible win in order to be able to pull back.
But, even then, the Iranians might not agree to an unconditional cease- fire, because they have seen this movie before. They agreed to a unilateral cease-fire that Trump imposed last year, only to be the target of an
illegal and reckless aggression eight months later. And so, they want to make sure that this is either a Security Council resolution or a big power
like China, for instance, intervenes and provides some sort of a security guarantee.
It is true that, at the end of the day, there is no such a thing as a binding guarantee, other than the fact that it becomes clear that this kind
of war is extremely costly and doesn't necessarily bring the kind of strategic objectives that the U.S. and Israel had in mind.
AMANPOUR: I want to talk about the Iranian people right now. You may have heard Secretary Hagel saying that the JCPOA was beginning to empower a
middle class, was beginning to lay the groundwork for them to take more of their life, their politics, their economy, their freedoms into their own
hands. And that might have, you know, mitigated the hardline reality. A lot of people say that's just wishful thinking.
And right now, as you know, there's a whole Gen Z who obviously, like everybody, is suffering under the bombings, but want to see this regime
toppled once and for all. Tell me about that, you know, because many who believed that there may be some glimmer in reform or whatever have been --
have sort of been discredited.
VAEZ: Yes, I think Secretary Hagel is right, that in 2015, there was space for strengthening the middle class in Iran. If there was 10 years of 5
percent economic growth, the middle class will grow from 65 percent to around 85 percent. And that would coincide with basically the ruling elites
who were in their 70s and 80s dying out by the force of nature.
And so, the country by now would be in a better place to transition to something more moderate. But what President Trump did in 2018, by
withdrawing from the nuclear deal, reimposing sanctions, was to reverse this dynamic. He weakened and impoverished the middle class and
strengthened the hard men with guns in the Islamic Republic.
So, Iran of 2026 is definitely not Iran of 2025 and -- of 2015. And the Iranian people definitely would like to see the back of this regime. The
question here is, you know, without any doubt, bombs can destroy military capabilities, degrade infrastructure, but they cannot manufacture an
alternative. And that alternative does not exist on the ground.
So, although a lot of people would like to see their tormentors being punished or eliminated, but in the aftermath of this war, the only force
that can emerge that could hold the country together, again, are those men with arms and guns. And that's unfortunately the Revolutionary Guards.
AMANPOUR: And what about way back under Khatami, the president who came in actually overtly promising a whole sort of moderated version of the Islamic
Republic, and even talked about entering nuclear negotiations with the United States. Then there was the axis of evil speech that President Bush
delivered, lumping Iran in with North Korea and Iraq. And the whole thing just stopped. And the reformers if -- you know, if people believed in that
were discredited.
You -- you know, you studied that pretty closely. Was there really an opportunity to try to moderate and improve relations with the West in the
early 2000s?
VAEZ: Christiane, you know that better than anyone that the history of Iran-U.S. relations is replete with missed opportunities and
miscalculations on both sides. You're absolutely right that the Khatami era was an opportunity for a new beginning, and was missed because both sides
always allowed the perfect to be the enemy of good enough. That Khatami's more friendly tone was not enough, and the expectation was that Iran would
also unilaterally change its regional policy.
The United States rarely recognized that Iran would have any kind of legitimate security concerns. The Iranians, for their part, too, they never
understood that they could play a more constructive role in the region. And by having direct channels of communication with the United States, they
could correct perceptions about Iran and its policies and its hopes and fears. And again, it's a very long history.
I think the biggest moment of squandered opportunity, however, is really 2016, is right after the nuclear deal was negotiated and implemented. And I
think everybody after two and a half years of negotiations was exhausted and failed to build on that agreement before the tide turned with President
Trump's return to office. There could be steps towards normalization of relations.
Instead, the Iranians took more American citizens hostage. They doubled down on their regional policy and missile policy. And President Obama
turned around and started selling arms to Iran's neighbors. That, I think, was in at least the past two decades, the most important moment of mistake.
AMANPOUR: Let me ask you this. I was speaking to the former Israeli prime minister last night, and he was saying that, you know, we have taken out
now the centrifuge ability, the missile launch ability, the actual missile ability, that even if they wanted to start a nuclear program again after
this, they wouldn't have any means to deliver it.
[13:35:00]
Others have said that actually you could -- with all that highly enriched uranium they have, they could actually do so with just a few centrifuges.
You're the nuclear expert. I want you to answer that. But also, once this is over, if that regime is still in place, do you think that they will
decide to go for the bomb?
VAEZ: Well, first of all, the religious edict that the former supreme leader had in place against nuclear weapons died with him. And given the
fact that the country has now paid the economic price of a nuclear weapon through years of sanctions and has been attacked twice in less than a year,
I think there is plenty of intent and motivation to try to -- excuse me, try to weaponize Iran's nuclear know-how.
The real question is whether -- given the degree of intelligence penetration in the Iranian system, they would be able to do so without
detection after this war. But, Christiane, what is important to understand is that the stockpile of highly enriched uranium that Iran has is
sufficient for 10 sophisticated nuclear warheads. But it is also enough for rudimentary, sort of like crude nuclear weapons. And if Iran manages to do
a test, so we see a boom in the desert one day, we wouldn't know if Iran has managed to weaponize more of its nuclear warheads, would have maybe
dirty bombs out of that stockpile.
And so, we would be in a situation that would create enough nuclear ambiguity that Iran would be able to sit behind that nuclear shield. And
this is why at the end of this war, if the president has not been able to address the fate of that stockpile, regardless of what else he has
achieved, I think this war would have been considered an absolute failure, especially given the fact that there was a diplomatic path to try to take
that nuclear material out of Iran.
It was put on the table on the sidelines of the General Assembly in New York in September. It was put on the table again during the nuclear
negotiations that happened in the city that I'm sitting in on February 26.
AMANPOUR: Well, the Omani foreign minister who was mediating has said that this war is the biggest miscalculation of this administration. But very
quickly in 30 seconds, don't you think Iran's policies over the last 47 years have been revealed as massive miscalculations? It's attacks against
the right of Israel, Hamas, Hezbollah, the whole nuclear aggressive talk about it and program.
VAEZ: Absolutely. Iran has miscalculated gravely. And I think it allowed its ideology and its domestic politics to blind it. But at the end of the
day, there is plenty of blame to go around. The U.S. made mistakes. Iran made mistakes. I think Israel has also made mistakes. And so, did Iran's
neighbors. This figure has as many authors, Christiane.
AMANPOUR: And as always, it's the people who will be caught in the middle trying to pick up the pieces and see what kind of a life they have for the
future. Ali Vaez, thank you very much indeed. And we will be right back after this short break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[13:40:00]
AMANPOUR: Now, the MAGA movement is very fractured over the Iran war, but there are other issues sowing divisions within. Rampant misogyny is one of
them. And young women who were once drawn to MAGA are defecting, disillusioned by the explicit cruel and fickle sexism they see.
In his recent New York Magazine article, journalist Sam Adler-Bell writes about "The Women Leaving the New Right," and he's speaking to Michel Martin
about it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MICHEL MARTIN, CONTRIBUTOR: Thanks Christiane. Sam Adler-Bell, thanks so much for talking with us.
SAM ADLER-BELL, CONTRIBUTOR, NEW YORK MAGAZINE AND CO-HOST, "KNOW YOUR ENEMY" PODCAST: Hi, I'm glad to be here.
MARTIN: Your story's crazy. The short version is conservative women who have buyer's remorse. Fair? Fair?
ADLER-BELL: Yes, that's a good way to put it.
MARTIN: How did you get onto this?
ADLER-BELL: Well, I mean, I have a sort of group of sources on the right that I talk to relatively frequently for my work, for my podcasts, and also
for my reporting. And so, I'm kind of always in touch with them trying to like get a sense of where things are at, what's going on internally. I
mean, there's an enormous amount of internal conflict on the right that we wouldn't necessarily know about if there wasn't people doing this kind of
reporting.
And in this case, the way it came to me was really last fall after Nick Fuentes, this kind of pipsqueak anti-Semitic incel character who's very
popular on the online right. He was interviewed by Tucker Carlson, as many people might remember. And a lot of the fallout from that, there was sort
of internal to the right, a lot of dissension over it. But a lot of the fallout was about, you know, his anti-Semitism, a little bit about his
racism.
But when I was talking to women on the right, people that I know, they were frustrated that nobody was talking about the main thing, the kind of least
ironic and most kind of obvious and painful aspect of Fuentes' self- presentation, which is that he hates women. And it's just so apparent. And they were frustrated that while the right was having this internal debate
about where to draw the lines about anti-Semitism and about racism, they weren't talking about the sexism, which from their perspective has become
kind of the lifeblood of the movement that they are a part of.
MARTIN: So, your piece opens with somebody called Anna, and she doesn't want to be identified by her real name for reasons you're going to tell us.
But tell us Anna's story.
ADLER-BELL: Well, Anna is really a representative character for a certain kind of young woman who was attracted to the right during Trump's first
term, who was a very talented writer, became a popular pundit, writing for major outlets, working in conservative institutions, and often writing
about women as a woman, including this kind of narrative that the right was adopting at the time that women are really unwell, you know, that feminism
has diverted their natural motherly instincts into this quest for worldly success.
And now, that they have it, women are using this newfound authority to punish and fetter men, which imperils civilization in the process. This is
the kind of thing that Anna was writing. But her experience is one that is representative of a lot of people I talk to in the piece, which is that
over time, she started to see that basically she was, you know, basically selling people the rope to hang herself.
You know, she started to realize that she was participating in a movement that was using her and that it wasn't worth it really to, you know, get
this kind of career and status on the right, as the right sort of basically made their whole project about punishing women, pushing them out of public
life, out of the workplace. And she did start to see that this was wrong and that she didn't want to be a part of it. And that's, you know, where
she came to me at that point, this moment of kind of one foot in, one foot out, not ready to come out and say what you wanted to say under her own
name.
And I think, to be clear, she's not making money on the right anymore. She has left, you know, those positions that she once had. Her fear, I mean,
her motivation for keeping her name out of the piece. And I do believe this is out of fear. People who support Nick Fuentes, who is sort of one of the
antagonists in this piece, they say they will rape, die and kill for Nick Fuentes. You know, they say this smirkingly, ironically, they might say.
But nonetheless, Anna is somebody who lives around a lot of conservatives. She's somebody who was very connected, personal, on a personal and
professional level with this movement. And she fears retaliation.
MARTIN: At what point would you say the break came for her? Was it having kids herself where she realized, A, I don't want that life for my kids, or
was it realizing that being a mother, being a trad wife is actually harder than it looks?
[13:45:00]
ADLER-BELL: Well, I mean, there's -- we're combining two stories a little bit here because one of the people I spoke to, Alex Kaschuta (ph), who is
named in the piece, she describes very vividly that it was partially having kids where she realized that this sort of trad life, you know, trend on the
right about, oh, women should just want to be mothers and stay at home and just focus on, you know, tending their garden and growing and making food
with their kids, that that was ridiculous.
That was totally absurd, first of all, because she wanted to continue to have, you know, a career, but also because the idea that she would have to
do everything for the kids and her husband would do none of it was totally untenable and just would not work. She says it kicks the trad out of you
really fast. And I think that's -- that was a big, big part of it for her.
I think she also talks about -- Alex talks about how when she was on the right and before she had kids, you know, she accepted the idea that, you
know, female coded things were low status. And that was something that she experienced amongst the men on the right. But once she became a mother and
sort of experienced her womanhood in that way, she ceased to feel that way and thought that was an absurd thing to think.
I mean, I think this is another important part of this, which is that while people like Fuentes and Andrew Tate and Tristan Tate and these sort of red
pill, awful, minuscule menace for people are saying, you know, we're going to be awful to women. We're advertising it, that we're going to that our
authority is going to be fickle and vicious. On the other hand, you have the traditionalists who are saying women need to be -- you know, re-subject
to male authority, totally dependent upon them. All the rudiments of the ability to have an independent life, we're going to take those things away
from women.
And so, what you're -- what you've got here is what I described in the piece as a pincer movement. On the one hand, you have the traditionalists
saying, you can't have an independent life. You are going to be forced into a marriage and forced into a home. And at the same time, on the sort of red
pill right, you have people say, and the authority of men is going to be awful.
MARTIN: What's fascinating to me is that I'm just wondering why they didn't figure this out before. These incels, these -- I don't know, these
brute force guys, I'm just wondering why would anybody go for that?
ADLER-BELL: I would say that the prominence of these red pill -- you know, as you say, the brute force guys in the MAGA movement and the sort of
acceptability of their views has just grown and grown and grown. They undermine the plausibility of the old conservative patriarchal Christian
deal, you know, because that involved a certain amount of reciprocity.
Now, these people are saying, no, men don't have to do anything. And in fact, they can treat women awful -- awfully. And nonetheless, women should
subject -- you know, submit to their authority. And I think that became more and more clear and more and more sort of just explicit amongst various
spheres of the MAGA world, and that contributed to, you know, these women moving away from it.
MARTIN: How widespread do you think, does your reporting indicate that those attitudes are? How prevalent are those attitudes among men who
consider themselves who are part of the MAGA movement?
ADLER-BELL: Yes. I mean, it's hard to judge. I mean, one thing to look at is just how incredibly popular Nick Fuentes is. How popular is he? I mean,
he was banned from X, the X platform. And when he was welcomed back by Elon Musk, his audience grew from a couple hundred thousand to well over a
million now. He gets more than a million views on many of his streams, his live streams that he posts on Rumble.
And I've heard from sources within the White House, within the Trump administration, that there is no doubt that the younger people who work
there, the junior staffer class, that many of them listen to Nick Fuentes. So, there is -- this is not quarantined to just, you know, I don't know,
our idea of the incel loser in the basement, these are people who have actual power over policymaking in the current government who are listening
to this stuff, absorbing it and talking about it.
Another source who works on the Hill, a conservative, a devoted MAGA operative, he told me that all men are really concerned about this,
quote/unquote, "feminization of public life." And basically. what that means is that there's too many women involved in positions of power. I
mean, one of the things I write in the piece, which I think does sort of, you know, encapsulate this is that if you if you listen and you pay close
attention to all of the problems that the right, particularly the MAGA right, is diagnosing at the center of every problem is a woman with too
much power.
[13:50:00]
MARTIN: And how widespread do you think, based on your reporting, is this disillusionment among women who used to consider themselves part of this
movement?
ADLER-BELL: Yes, that's also hard to judge. I mean, the women that I spoke to say that every single woman involved in conservative politics knows
about this problem and they are talking about it with each other, whether they have decided it's fine, it's not a big deal, or they've decided it is
a it is a problem, but I can't leave. This is my career. This is my livelihood. And I have sort of political goals that are more important than
my hurt feelings or whatever.
Whatever their response to it is, the fact -- the sources that I've talked to say that all women involved in MAGA politics are aware of this problem.
And, you know, you see it sort of come out in little bits and pieces every once in a while. You know, you had The New York Times reporting on women in
Congress who are disappointed by Mike Johnson's leadership saying that he's too patriarchal. He's not listening to women's voices. You saw it with the
sort of revolt over the Epstein files, which was led by conservative women.
In little glimpses, you can see that this problem is there. But for the most part, amongst this sort of pundit, influencer, operative class of
women that were most of my sources for this piece, they're talking about it in private. They're talking about it in group chats. They're comparing
notes about, you know, bad men they've encountered in the movement. But they're not, for the most part, coming out publicly and, you know, calling
for a reckoning.
MARTIN: This is white people, I assume.
ADLER-BELL: These are white women.
MARTIN: These are white people thing. These are all white women, right?
ADLER-BELL: Yes.
MARTIN: Just because I'm -- in the African-American context, they're just not sustainable. I mean, African-American women have just a long history of
being heads of house, those co-equal partners.
ADLER-BELL: Yes.
MARTIN: You know, especially in the modern era.
ADLER-BELL: Yes. I would just say, I mean, something that should be noted about this whole phenomenon, and it is mostly white women who are -- who
get these jobs and who are working in conservative politics. And, you know, we can applaud them for, you know, coming around and seeing that, you know,
sexism is a huge problem and that this thing that's affecting them is making them upset and maybe, you know, considering leaving conservative
politics or the MAGA movement.
But it's fair to say that they've tolerated an enormous amount of racism, which, you know, doesn't affect them personally and therefore isn't the
thing that has pushed them out of the movement. I mean, this movement is unbelievably and explicitly racist, and that wasn't the thing that caused
these women to change their mind.
MARTIN: What's interesting about Trump, though, is how many women in his orbit have had significant power. He did appoint the first female chief of
staff in White House history. That is, in fact, his press secretary, you know, who he seems to think highly of, you know, is a woman, the head of
one of these largest departments. Yes, Kristi Noem, he recently, you know, dismissed her. But the fact is, that is one of the largest agencies. That's
one of the agencies that that has been sort of marked for prominence in this administration. She did have that role. It is it is understood that he
did consider women as running mates.
ADLER-BELL: Yes.
MARTIN: You know, obviously you thought about it and some of the people you interviewed thought about it. What do they say?
ADLER-BELL: Well, I mean, I think that's a good point. I mean, there is a difference between Trump and the movement that's growing around him. And I
think, you know, whatever we want to say about Trump, he's won two national elections and he's done so because he does have a feel for how to build a,
you know, plausible majority for his politics.
A lot of these people who are these right-wing men in the manosphere, the Nick Fuentes of the world, their project is totally different. I mean,
they're just trying to maintain this audience and keep them rabid and angry and clicking on their videos and watching them. And there is a tension
between this part of the movement that is -- feels apparently no compunction about alienating half the population and the project -- the
political project of Trump and MAGA, which, you know, needs to try to win majorities, win congressional majorities and, you know, win in 2028,
whoever the candidate is.
And there is -- you know, there is a fear about that, I think. You're starting to see it's partly -- partially what this piece is about, but in
other sectors, too, there's this fear of what happens when Trump leaves the stage? If he's not there, do we think J.D. Vance is going to be able to
hold that coalition together? I mean, that's the fear, I think, that is represented by all of this contestation over whether it's sexism in my
piece or last year, the conversations over anti-Semitism. This is the fear.
And, you know, conservative operatives, people who are working in the movement don't want to talk about it because Trump doesn't want to hear or
be reminded of the fact that he's not going to be in charge forever. But that's why this is happening.
MARTIN: Sam Adler-Bell, thanks so much for talking with us.
ADLER-BELL: Thank you. This was really nice.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
[13:55:00]
AMANPOUR: And finally, it's New Year's Eve in Iran and parts of Afghanistan. Nowruz is centered around the spring solstice of renewal, hope
and light. This year, war does cast a dark shadow over celebrations. For over 3000 years, the Iranians have taken part in longstanding traditions,
including the fire festival, Chaharshanbe Suri, where people jump over small bonfires and set off fireworks. It's meant as a way of cleansing and
warding off misfortune.
But inside Iran, morale is quite low as war fatigue sets in. Markets that would be bustling with holiday shoppers are quiet under the bombs. And
while there is hope for change this Nowruz, the year ahead is bound by an uncertain future.
That is it for now. Thank you for watching, and goodbye from London.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[14:00:00]
END
