Nigel Farage, the leader of Reform UK, said Thursday he fears President Donald Trump will respond to his party's midterm defeat by pressing harder against Iran. He warned that more strikes would carry even heavier costs for oil prices, inflation and the wider Western world.
Farage first urged support for the war but now calls it a mistake. He said Trump broke a promise of no more foreign wars, leaving the U.S. eight months into a conflict with no end in sight. He argued that the war and the fuel prices that followed are what cost Republicans at the polls.
His warning landed as Trump's own team pinned the loss on the same conflict. Vice President JD Vance wrote in a long social media post Wednesday that the war was the main reason Republicans lost, adding that Trump had said as much the night before.
If you’d like to argue it was worth it, that losing the Senate for the next 6 years was worth it, then do so.
JD Vance, U.S. vice president
Trump told reporters Wednesday afternoon that Vance was largely right, pointing to a short-term jump in gasoline prices. Still, he said he would launch the war again, arguing Iran cannot be allowed a nuclear weapon. He had insisted a day earlier that he did not regret the joint attack on Iran with Israel.
That stance matters beyond U.S. borders. In recent weeks, Trump has warned that the U.S. and Israel could return to all-out war after the midterms if no deal to end the fighting is reached. The war began in February, and Iran has kept the Strait of Hormuz shipping route blocked, tightening the world's oil supply.
Democrats took control of Congress on Tuesday. Republicans gave up a large House majority and lost Senate and governor races, some in states where the Trump-Vance ticket had won by 10 points or more two years earlier.
Vance said turnout was not the problem. Instead, he wrote, many 2024 Republican voters switched sides over four issues: ending the war, the cost of living, putting America first and changing the U.S. relationship with Israel.
Vance, a former Marine who served in Iraq, called that war an unforced disaster in a 2023 post. He is viewed as a leading contender for the 2028 Republican presidential nomination, and his post marked an unusual public break by a sitting vice president.
In Britain, Prime Minister Andy Burnham said earlier this week he hoped the results would let countries unite around the cost of living. Farage, who still calls Trump a friend but has not spoken to him since the vote, described the outcome as a complete wipeout for Republicans.
