00:00John Parkinson with ABC News. Thanks for bringing us along on this historic trip. I wanted to
00:08ask you about last week's news with the Atlantic. We've had a couple of questions in the room
00:13and I feel like you've answered that. But I did want to ask, did you express your concerns
00:17to the President that you were opposed to the Houthi strike? And also, what did you
00:22mean when you said in that thread that the President wasn't aware that his directions
00:27for Yemen were inconsistent with his message on Europe? Well, I didn't quite say that.
00:32I think that's a slight misunderstanding of what I said. But we've talked, of course,
00:37in the American media about Signalgate, as I called it, for the past week. And here's
00:42what I told the President and the entire national security team, is that yes, it is in the interest
00:48of the United States of America to preserve navigation. Yes, it is in the interest of
00:52the United States to kill terrorists who are preventing navigation in the Red Sea.
00:58But we've got to make sure that we do it right. We have to be careful. We have to make sure
01:01the timing is right. And of course, what that leak revealed, I think, is a private communication
01:06between the President's senior advisors about how best to prepare the American people for
01:11what we all thought we had to do, about the right timing of when we should do something,
01:16and of course, surfacing the strategic questions that we needed to decide and brief the President
01:21on so that he could ultimately make the decision about what we would do.
01:24What I saw in that signal chat, and of course, what I've seen in the President's senior national
01:28security team, is that sometimes we all agree and sometimes we all disagree. But it's important
01:34that we all have an honest conversation amongst ourselves and with the President of the United
01:38States about what we think is in the best interest of the national security of the United
01:42States of America. I support the President's decision to strike the Houthis. I've always
01:47supported the President's decision to strike the Houthis, and I support the national security
01:51team having the argument about how best to serve the American people.
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