The Trump administration’s United Nations ambassador was swarmed by critics Sunday who dubbed his interview with NBC News’ Kristen Welker “disastrous.”
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Mike Waltz issued several seemingly conflicting statements in his conversation with Welker about recent reporting that the Trump administration has held off on escalating its attacks on Iran.
Welker noted the report linked the delay to military stockpile shortages, and asked Waltz id said reporting was accurate.
Waltz pushed back on the idea that the Trump administration lacked adequate stockpiles — but also blamed shortages on the Biden administration.
“A lot of stockpiles were depleted from what we gave Ukraine over the last four, five years,” Waltz said. “[Defense] Secretary [Pete] Hegseth inherited a depleted situation from not only Ukraine, but also the ongoing fight with the Houthis under the Biden administration, and the depleted military under the Biden administration!”
Welker then asked if Waltz was admitting that U.S. military weapons were “depleted at this moment.”
“No,” he snapped. “I want to be crystal clear: the U.S. military – and I’ve verified this every which way – has everything that it needs to conduct this campaign as effectively as it needs to be.”
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Waltz added, “The people that are leaking this nonsense deserve to be in jail.”
The contradictory comments did not go unnoticed online.
John Jackson, an American pro-Ukraine commentator and former trial lawyer, flagged Waltz’s remarks in a blunt post on X.
“Disastrous interview,” Jackson wrote. “He uses the word depleted then acts like he didn’t. About as coherent as our policy on Iran.”
Writer and political commentator Jim Stewartson echoed Jackson’s assessment in a post on X to his more than 152,000 followers.
“The official U.S. position is that ammunition is depleted because of Biden but also you should go to jail for saying ammunition is depleted,” Stewartson wrote.
Litigation attorney Dilan Esper quipped that you could see Waltz’s “nose grow in real time” over the course of the interview, and Ryan Goodman, a prominent national security law scholar, noted the contradiction in Waltz’s remark about jailing leakers.
“Pro tip: If they deserve to be in jail then … it’s not nonsense. Jail time is for leaking genuine intelligence information,” Goodman wrote in a social media post on X to his more than 186,000 followers.
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WELKER: Is America backing away from a larger military attack because our stockpile has been depleted?
MIKE WALTZ: We have to take a step back here. A lot of our stockpiles were depleted because of Biden.
WELKER: But you acknowledge they’re depleted?
WALTZ: No. And the people… pic.twitter.com/tcLAB3xkmf
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 26, 2026
