White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt opened Wednesday's briefing with a blunt message to Tehran: President Trump "does not bluff, and he is prepared to unleash hell." The warning landed as the joint U.S.-Israeli military campaign against Iran entered its fourth week and as a senior Iranian official told Reuters the regime was still reviewing an American proposal to end the war, despite an initially negative response.
The statement marks the sharpest public ultimatum yet from the administration, placing full responsibility for any further bloodshed on Iran's refusal to negotiate. It also comes with a concrete timeline. The Washington Free Beacon reported that Trump told reporters he will decide within two weeks whether to authorize a direct U.S. strike on Iran, while leaving a narrow window for last-minute talks.
That combination, overwhelming military pressure paired with a ticking clock, is the clearest sign yet that the White House views diplomacy and force as two ends of the same lever, not separate tracks.
Leavitt used the briefing to lay out the scale of what the administration calls Operation Epic Fury. She said U.S. forces have struck more than 9,000 targets and that Iranian missile and drone attacks have fallen by roughly 90 percent since the campaign began. She called the destruction of Iran's navy "the largest elimination of a navy over a three-week period since World War II", a claim she repeated for emphasis.
Fox News Digital reported that Leavitt said Iran lost its senior leadership, its air force, its air defense system, and its navy in what she described as a campaign ahead of schedule. The original estimate from Trump and the Department of War was four to six weeks. Twenty-five days in, Leavitt said, "the greatest military the world has ever known is ahead of schedule and performing exceptionally day by day."
She also linked the current operation to a prior strike. Iran's nuclear ambitions, she said, "have been crushed to an even greater degree than they were in Operation Midnight Hammer in June 2025." That earlier operation followed internal administration pressure for military action, and Leavitt framed the current campaign as the logical extension of that posture.
"The Iranian regime is being crippled, and their ability to threaten the United States and our allies is being significantly weakened."
That was Leavitt's summary of where things stand. She added that the regime's losses explain why Tehran is "beginning to look for an exit ramp."
Media outlets reported Tuesday that Washington had sent Tehran a 15-point plan to end the war. Leavitt did not confirm the full plan. "There are elements of truth to it," she said, "but some of the stories I read were not entirely factual, so I am not going to negotiate on behalf of the president here at the podium."
What the administration will confirm is that talks are ongoing and that Trump considers them productive. Leavitt referenced the president's own remarks from Monday, saying, "They are productive, as the president said on Monday, and they continue to be." She also confirmed that Trump has temporarily delayed planned strikes on some Iranian energy targets to give negotiations room to breathe.
The Free Beacon's reporting added a key detail: any deal acceptable to the president would require a full ban on Iranian uranium enrichment and prevent Iran from obtaining material for a nuclear weapon. The administration believes there is still "a substantial chance" for near-term negotiations, which is why the final decision on a strike has been delayed, but only for two weeks.
Iran, for its part, has not slammed the door shut. A senior Iranian official told Reuters on Wednesday that the regime is still reviewing the U.S. proposal, even though its initial response was negative. Multiple countries, Pakistan, Turkey, and Egypt, have stepped in with mediation efforts as the conflict drags into a fourth week.
Global markets took the diplomatic signals as a mild positive. Equity markets regained some ground Wednesday, and oil prices dipped after reports about the proposed plan surfaced. But those gains are fragile, tied entirely to whether Tehran decides to negotiate or dig in.
The New York Post reported that thousands of U.S. Marines are arriving in the region for a possible mission tied to reopening the Strait of Hormuz, a critical chokepoint for global oil shipments and one of the stated objectives of Operation Epic Fury. Leavitt confirmed that securing the strait is a campaign goal but declined to comment on reports that the 82nd Airborne Division was being prepped for potential action in the Middle East.
"The president likes to maintain options at his disposal," Leavitt said. "It's the Pentagon's job to provide those options to the commander in chief." She redirected reporters seeking troop-deployment specifics to the Pentagon.
The posture is unmistakable. Ground forces moving into theater. A navy already destroyed. Air defenses gone. And a president who has publicly set a two-week deadline. This is not saber-rattling. It is the kind of military positioning that precedes either a deal or an escalation, with no middle ground left.
Leavitt's most pointed language was reserved for assigning responsibility. She framed every possible future casualty as Iran's choice, not America's.
"There does not need to be any more death and destruction, but if Iran fails to accept the reality of the current moment, if they fail to understand that they have been defeated militarily and will continue to be, President Trump will ensure they are hit harder than they have ever been hit before."
She went further: "Any violence beyond this point will be because the Iranian regime refused to understand they have already been defeated and refused to come to a deal."
That framing is deliberate and aimed at more than just Tehran. It is a message to domestic critics, including lawmakers like Sen. Van Hollen, who has accused the administration of possible war crimes, and to the international community. The White House wants the record to show that it offered an off-ramp and that Iran chose the highway.
It is also a rebuke to voices in the foreign-policy establishment who have argued for trusting Iran's word over the administration's approach. Former CIA Director John Brennan publicly sided with Tehran's credibility over Trump's in the nuclear-talks debate, a position that looks increasingly disconnected from events on the ground.
The question now is whether Iran's fractured leadership can make a decision fast enough. Internal power struggles within the regime have complicated past negotiations, and the loss of senior military leaders during Operation Epic Fury may have made the chain of command even more uncertain. Leavitt's warning that Iran "should not miscalculate again" suggests the administration is aware that dysfunction in Tehran could produce the wrong answer by default.
Trump has given Iran a narrow path: give up enrichment, accept defeat, come to the table. The military campaign has already removed most of Iran's conventional leverage. What remains is the regime's pride and its bet that international pressure will restrain Washington.
That bet looks worse by the day. Marines are landing. The 82nd Airborne may follow. And the president has put a number on his patience: two weeks.
When a regime that sponsors terror, threatens nuclear breakout, and fires on American allies gets a clear warning backed by 9,000 strikes and a deadline, the right response is simple: take the deal. The wrong response has a name. The White House already gave it one.
