President Donald Trump casually offered up two U.S. cities for Iran to “take out” while rambling about how the deadly war he launched is a “small price to pay.”
The 80-year-old president floated the disturbing proposition Monday while speaking at a rally in Grand Island, Nebraska, where Republicans are facing an unexpectedly tough fight to hold onto their Senate seat.
“Remember, with the war, it’s just artificial. It’s a little bit high,” he began, apparently referring to the war driving up prices for Americans—most glaringly at the pump, where the national average now stands at $4.37 a gallon.
“It’s a small price to pay for keeping the world safe, keeping our country safe,” the billionaire president continued, before chillingly appearing to suggest that he would accept the destruction of two U.S. cities home to millions of Americans.
“They can take out a city—let ’em take, let ’em take out Los Angeles, let ’em take out San Diego. That’s—this is a very small price to pay,” he said, naming the two Democrat-led cities in California.
The MAGA crowd in Nebraska cheered.
“And it’s going to be over very soon,” Trump continued. “It’s essentially almost over with. And they might keep going a little long, you know. They always say they have a big threshold for pain. They need it, let me tell you.”
The commander-in-chief, who is in control of the nuclear codes and whose cognitive health has come under mounting scrutiny, added that the seven-month-old war will end “one way or the other.”
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom responded to Trump’s comments on X. “After sending the National Guard and Marines to occupy California, Donald Trump is now saying our foreign enemies should ‘take out’ Los Angeles and San Diego. He is deranged and dangerous,” Newsom wrote.
“Disgusting and disqualifying,” he wrote in another.
Newsom’s Press Office X account made a separate post later, stating, “Let’s be clear: The President is advocating for an attack on 10+ million U.S. residents in two of America’s largest cities. This is not normal. None of this is. And we will continue to remind folks of that every day.”
San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria also hit back at Trump, posting on X, “San Diego is not collateral damage. We are not expendable. And we are never a ‘small price to pay’. Keep our city out of your reckless war talk.”
No other U.S. president appears to have ever suggested that the bombing of a U.S. city would be an acceptable cost.
Trump has previously invoked the specter of mass death, threatening in April to wipe out Iran’s “whole civilization.” But suggesting that American cities could take the hit marks new territory.
That doesn’t mean he hasn’t flirted with imagery of destruction on American soil before. In September 2025, while he was threatening to send National Guard troops into Chicago, the president posted an AI-generated Apocalypse Now parody image depicting military helicopters flying over the flame-engulfed city.
Trump’s description of the war as a “small price” also comes across as a particularly bitter message to the U.S. service members who have been killed and injured in the quagmire.
The total number of war wounded rose to 861 last week, according to updated numbers in the Pentagon’s Defense Casualty Analysis System (DCAS). At least 19 service members have been killed, although U.S. officials told The Washington Post that there are at least three more that are missing from the tally.
