President Trump on Monday said his administration is looking for a “leaker” who shared information with the media about a daring rescue mission after a U.S. fighter jet was downed inside Iran last week.
“We didn’t talk about the first one for an hour and then somebody leaked something,” Trump told reporters during a press conference at the White House. “Which, we’ll hopefully find that leaker, we’re looking very hard for them. … We think we’ll be able to find it out.”
The president suggested media outlets that reported on the downed jet and the status of its crew before the government put information out about the incident could face criminal prosecution.
“We’re going to go to the media company that released it,” the president said. “And we’re going to say national security, give it up or go to jail. And we know who and you know who we’re talking about, because there’s some things you can’t do and all of a sudden the entire country of Iran knew there was a pilot that was somewhere on their land.”
Trump said media reporting on the incident made the rescue mission for the missing pilot more difficult.
“But we have to find that leaker because that’s a sick person,” Trump said. “Probably didn’t realize the extent of how bad it was … but we’re going to find out it’s national security and the person that did the story will go to jail if he doesn’t say. They put this mission at great risk.”
Trump did not call out any specific media organization by name, but a number of outlets including The New York Times, Fox News and Axios were among the first to report on the downed plane.
U.S. forces over the weekend were able to locate and rescue the two service members whose F-15E Strike Eagle was downed.
Trump and military officials at the Monday press conference discussed the rescue, describing it as a spectacular mission and a humiliation for Iran.
Trump and his allies have ramped up pressure on media outlets since the war began, bashing coverage of the conflict as overly critical and accusing journalists at mainstream outlets of not being supportive enough of ongoing operations there.
Monday’s press conference came just hours before the president’s deadline for Iran to cut a ceasefire deal before what he calls a “total obliteration” of the country’s infrastructure.
