A top counterterrorism official within the Trump administration has resigned from his post in protest of President Donald Trump’s war with Iran, marking the first public internal clash over the United States’ expanding military operations in the Middle East.
Joseph Kent, the director of the National Counterterrorism Center, said he could not in “good conscience” support the ongoing war, citing that the Middle Eastern adversary “posed no imminent threat to our nation.” In a letter resigning effective Tuesday, Kent wrote, “It is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby.”
Kent, a strong MAGA supporter and combat veteran, told President Trump that while he supported Trump’s foreign policies when he campaigned in 2016, 2020, and 2024, in his second term he was “deceived into believing that Iran posed an imminent threat to the United States, and that should you strike now, there was a clear path to a swift victory.”
The counterterrorism official explained, “This was a lie and is the same tactic the Israelis used to draw us into the disastrous Iraq war that cost our nation the lives of thousands of our best men and women. We cannot make this mistake again.”
Ironically, Kent’s boss, Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s Director of National Intelligence, has for years said the same about a hypothetical war against Iran. However, Gabbard has yet to publicly comment on the war since Trump launched strikes on Feb. 28.
“In your first administration, you understood better than any modern president how to decisively apply military power without getting us drawn into never-ending wars. You demonstrated this by killing Qasam Solamani and by defeating ISIS,” said Kent, who said he lost his wife Shannon in a “war manufactured by Israel.”
He added, “I cannot support sending the next generation off to fight and die in a war that serves no benefit to the American people nor justifies the cost of American lives.”
Conservative firebrand and podcaster Candace Owens quickly reacted to the news, calling Joe Kent an “American hero, patriot and veteran.”
Owens added, “Trump is a shameful President. May American troops take his lead and look into conscientious objection to Bibi’s Red Heifer War. Goyim stand down.”
In his letter, Kent urged Trump to rethink his decision to engage in further military action in Iran.
“I pray that you will reflect upon what we are doing in Iran and who we are doing it for. The time for bold action is now,” he wrote. “You can reverse course and chart a new path for our nation, or you can allow us to slip further toward decline and chaos. You hold the cards.”
