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In the wake of Joe Kent’s resignation from the position of National Counterterrorism Center director over his opposition to the Iran war, President Donald Trump highlighted a years-old tweet in which Kent had urged the president to “wipe Iran’s ballistic capability out.”
In the January 2020 post on X, Kent tagged the president and wrote, “We should not sit and wait for the next attack, wipe Iran’s ballistic capability out and get our troops out of Iraq – they are only targets now. No US WIA/KIA is a tribute to the professionalism of our military and intel professionals not Iranian restraint.”
Kent made the post in January 2020 after a U.S. strike earlier that month killed Qasem Soleimani, the head of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force.
TOP COUNTERTERRORISM OFFICIAL RESIGNS IN PROTEST OF US WAR AGAINST IRAN
Left: U.S. President Donald J. Trump sits at a table monitoring military operations during Operation Epic Fury against Iran, with U.S. flags visible behind him, in Washington, United States, on March 02, 2026; Right: Joseph Kent, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, during a House Homeland Security Committee hearing in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, Dec. 11, 2025. (Left: The White House via X Account/Anadolu via Getty Images; Right: Daniel Heuer/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
In the resignation letter that he posted to X on Tuesday, Kent asserted that Iran did not pose an imminent threat to the U.S.
“I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran. Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby,” Kent wrote.
IRANIAN INTELLIGENCE MINISTER KILLED IN PRECISION AIRSTRIKE, WHILE US MILITARY TARGETS MISSILE SITES
An Iranian flag is planted in the rubble of a police station, damaged in airstrikes yesterday, on March 3, 2026, in Tehran, Iran. (Majid Saeedi/Getty Images)
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard issued a post on X in which she noted that the president targeted Iran due to his view that the regime represented “an imminent threat.”
“The Office of the Director of National Intelligence is responsible for helping coordinate and integrate all intelligence to provide the President and Commander in Chief with the best information available to inform his decisions,” Gabbard said in the post.
TRUMP BIDS GOODBYE TO INTEL OFFICIAL WHO RESIGNED OVER IRAN: ‘GOOD THING THAT HE’S OUT’
Tulsi Gabbard, director of National Intelligence, during a cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday, Dec. 2, 2025. (Yuri Gripas/CNP/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
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“After carefully reviewing all the information before him, President Trump concluded that the terrorist Islamist regime in Iran posed an imminent threat and he took action based on that conclusion,” she noted.
