Donald Trump ignored reporters’ questions about the Iran conflict and three known U.S. troop fatalities on Sunday—stopping instead to admire some new statues outside the White House.
The bizarre moment came as the country absorbed the fallout from Operation Epic Fury—the joint U.S.-Israeli military campaign that killed Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, 86, along with dozens of other senior figures in Iran’s theocratic government. Three American service members died in Saturday’s operation, with five others wounded.
Trump, 79, had spent the weekend at Mar-a-Lago.
CNN’s Kristen Holmes, who was among the reporters waiting outside when Trump returned to Washington on Sunday evening, described the absurd scene.
“He usually stops and talks to the press—he completely ignored us,” she said, as first reported by Mediaite. “Instead [he] stopped and admired some new statues that were being put into the Rose Garden.
“We hadn’t seen them before, they appeared to be the Founding Fathers, saying, ‘Come look at them, they’re unbelievable.’ And then walked away.”
The statues—of Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin—were captured on video by CBS News associate producer Emma Nicholson, who posted to X a photo of Trump as he returned to the White House, and images of the statues.
“Unbelievable statues,” Nicholson said Trump had told reporters standing nearby, before heading inside without taking questions.
Holmes said the press corps had been pushing Trump on matters of direct consequence. “We were shouting questions: ‘What is your message for the families of the service members who were killed? How long are we going to be in this conflict?’” she said. “We have so little answers right now, we don’t know what is going to happen next.”
The exchange—or lack of one—came hours after Trump appeared on video for the first time since Operation Epic Fury began, pledging to “avenge” the deaths of the fallen while warning that there would “likely be more” American casualties before the conflict was over.
Earlier that same day, he told The Daily Mail that the mission against Iran would “take four weeks—or less,” but told different stories to a range of different outlets in a confusing 48 hours.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment.
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