US House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson defended President Donald Trump’s decision to start a war against Iran, suggesting that lying is part of the Iranian religion.
Johnson was asked by reporters on Tuesday about policies that have become increasingly unpopular under Republican presidents, including the decision to join Israel in starting a war with Iran in February.
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In response, the Speaker of the House of Representatives praised Trump, saying the US president had his “firm hands on the wheel.” After mentioning the U.S.-Canada trade war, he turned his attention to the Iran war.
“The problem, and the reason we’re frustrated, is that the Iranians simply can’t be trusted. They’ll sit down at the negotiating table and say something, but they’ll walk away and do the opposite,” Johnson said.
“For some of them, it’s apparently part of their religion that they can lie to people with whom they disagree, so that was difficult.”
Lying is strictly prohibited in Islam. Johnson’s office had not responded to Al Jazeera’s request for comment at the time of publication.
The Iran war is unpopular with the American public. On Monday, a University of Massachusetts national poll suggested that 54 percent of Americans do not support U.S. military action against Iran.
The standoff is expected to hurt Republicans’ chances of retaining a majority in both chambers of Congress in November’s midterm elections.
The conflict prompted Iran to close the Strait of Hormuz, causing oil and gas prices to soar in the United States and around the world.
But the Trump administration and its allies have repeatedly argued that the war was necessary to address an “imminent” nuclear threat from Tehran.
At a press conference on Tuesday, Johnson returned to that claim, saying the war was “necessary” because Iran was close to acquiring a nuclear weapon.
But that debate has been undermined by statements within the U.S. government.
Last June, for example, President Trump’s then-intelligence director Tulsi Gabbard told lawmakers that Iran had not weaponized its nuclear program.
“The IC (intelligence agency) continues to assess that Iran is not producing nuclear weapons, and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei has not approved a nuclear weapons program, which was halted in 2023,” Gabbard said at the time.
Within days of her remarks, on June 22, 2025, the U.S. military bombed three of Iran’s major enrichment facilities, and President Trump reiterated that the attack had “annihilated” Iran’s nuclear program.
The United States and Israel attacked Iran again in late February, sparking a full-scale regional war that President Trump had promised would last up to six weeks.
But the conflict entered its seventh month last week with no end in sight.
U.S. officials say the U.S. government has succeeded in loosening Tehran’s grip on the Strait of Hormuz and allowing millions of barrels of oil to be transported through the waterway each day, but American consumers still pay high prices for gasoline.
Rising energy costs are also fueling inflation across the U.S. economy.
But Johnson insisted that Washington’s allies would get involved in the conflict to help reopen the Strait, which they have so far refused to do.
“Currently, the Strait of Hormuz is open for trade, so we need the Red Sea and stability in the region,” he said.
“Other countries around the world, our NATO allies, the Arab countries in the region, have a bigger stake in this area than the Americans do. And I think they’re willing to help in that regard to make sure we keep trade open so we can have market stability.”
