Trump cancels plans to attend son’s wedding amid possible new strikes on Iran if last-minute talks fail
Iraqi national targeted Ivanka Trump in assassination plot
President Donald Trump canceled plans to attend his son Donald Trump Jr.’s wedding and returned to Washington after a speech in New York on Friday as he reportedly weighed possible new strikes on Iran if last-minute negotiations failed to produce a deal to end the war.
“While I very much wanted to be with my son, Don Jr., and the newest member of the Trump Family, his soon-to-be wife, Bettina, circumstances pertaining to Government, and my love for the United States of America, do not allow me to do so,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “I feel it is important for me to remain in Washington, D.C., at the White House during this important period of time. Congratulations to Don and Bettina!”
Axios reported that Trump had convened senior national security officials at the White House on Friday morning to review the status of talks with Iran and possible scenarios if diplomacy collapsed.
Vice President JD Vance, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Central Intelligence Agency Director John Ratcliffe and White House chief of staff Susie Wiles attended the meeting. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, were absent because Rubio was in Europe and Caine was at the U.S. Naval Academy graduation ceremony.
Several hours after the meeting, the White House reportedly changed Trump’s weekend schedule. After a planned speech in New York on Friday evening, he was set to return to Washington instead of staying at his Bedminster golf club in New Jersey.
The meeting ended without a decision on what would happen next, CNN reported.
Trump had been presented with options for restarting military action, and earlier in the week, he said he had been an hour away from ordering strikes before holding back at the request of Gulf nations.
Delegations from Qatar and Pakistan traveled to Tehran on Friday in an effort to end the conflict. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Ismail Baghaei was quoted as saying that there were still significant differences between the Iranian and U.S. positions and that an agreement would require more time and further negotiations.
Doha had previously distanced itself from mediation in the Iran war after coming under attack from Iranian missiles and drones during the latest conflict, Reuters noted.
Pakistan has served as the official mediator since fighting began, while Qatar has also acted as a U.S. ally in the region and as a back channel between Washington and Tehran.
A shaky ceasefire has been in place in the war that began with U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran on Feb. 28. The talks have been complicated by a U.S. blockade of Iranian ports and Tehran’s effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
A senior Iranian source was quoted as saying Thursday that no deal had been reached, though gaps had narrowed. Iran’s uranium enrichment and its control of the Strait remained among the sticking points.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry said Friday that talks were continuing but a deal was not close. The semi-official Tasnim news agency, affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC, quoted a source close to the Iranian negotiating team as saying talks on disputed issues were ongoing, and no final result had been reached.
The source said the current focus was ending the war and that no other issue would be negotiated until that had been achieved.
Asked Friday about the Qatari team in Iran, Rubio said Pakistan remained the primary country working with Washington on the talks and had done an admirable job.
A source close to Trump and a second source with knowledge of the situation said Trump had become increasingly frustrated with the negotiations in recent days.
On Tuesday, he told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he wanted to give diplomacy another chance, but by Thursday night, he was leaning toward ordering a strike, according to Axios.
A source close to Trump was quoted as saying that the president had raised the possibility of a final decisive major military operation, after which he could declare victory and end the war. There was no indication that Trump had made a decision to resume the war.
Meanwhile, the New York Post reported Friday that an Iraqi national recently captured had targeted Trump's daughter, Ivanka Trump, for assassination in an alleged plot tied to the U.S. killing of Iranian military chief Qasem Soleimani in Baghdad six years ago.
The man, identified as Mohammad Baqer Saad Dawood Al-Saadi, 32, was trained by the IRGC and had a blueprint of Ivanka Trump’s Florida home. Entifadh Qanbar, a former deputy military attaché at the Iraqi Embassy in Washington, was quoted as saying that Al-Saadi had made a pledge to kill her in retaliation for Soleimani’s death.
