The American Conservative Morning Briefing
September 04, 2026
Good morning! Today is Friday, September 4th 2026, and this is The American Conservative's Morning Brief. Day one hundred and eighty-eight of the Iran War brings fresh Iranian strikes on U.S. assets in Kuwait and the UAE, a reported American bombing of an Iranian wedding party, and gas prices at four dollars and fourteen cents a gallon. J.D. Vance takes the White House podium for the first time since Karoline Leavitt's exit, dodging questions on when the war ends, refusing to disown Tucker Carlson, and asking Americans for patience on the economy. Ted Snider dissects Trump's self-proclaimed "biggest oil deal in world history" in Venezuela, arguing the Pentagon's seizure of sixty-five billion barrels amounts to plunder that will neither lower pump prices soon nor survive Venezuela's own constitution. and now for the details. We begin with the Iran War, now in its one hundred and eighty-eighth day. Iran launched fresh retaliatory strikes on Thursday, targeting American assets in Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, in open defiance of President Trump's warning that any retaliation would be met with, in his words, an attack that would leave very little of the Islamic Republic remaining. The new strikes extend a tit-for-tat cycle that resumed Sunday night, when U.S. forces hit targets on Iran's Larak Island, breaking a month-long pause. Tehran said it was responding to what it called America's crimes against the Iranian people. As Andrew Day reports for The American Conservative, U.S. forces were responsible for a deadly bombing of a wedding party in southern Iran on Tuesday, according to a New York Times analysis. A six-year-old boy and at least four others were reported killed. Day notes conflicting signals from Washington on how long the war will last. The Wall Street Journal reports that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is quietly extending troop deployments, suggesting the conflict could drag into next year, even as Trump privately tells senior aides he favors declaring the war over. Reuters reports that aides are urging the president to keep the conflict contained through the November third midterms, with the White House prepared to escalate afterward. The war is already biting Americans at the pump. Brent crude was trading near ninety-seven dollars a barrel Thursday, and the average U.S. gasoline price stood at four dollars and fourteen cents, up from two dollars and ninety-eight cents on the eve of the war. At the White House, Vice President J.D. Vance led the first press briefing since Karoline Leavitt's departure as press secretary. As Luke Nicastro reports, Vance was asked whether the Iran War would end before the midterms, and he conceded he did not know the answer, adding that reporters would have to ask the Iranians. Vance also disputed the characterization of the conflict as a war, saying that right now there is no active shooting. Pressed on his relationship with commentator Tucker Carlson, who has been sharply critical of the administration's Middle East policy, Vance declined to distance himself. He called Carlson a friend, saying he would not throw friends under the bus over political disagreements, and adding that doing so would be a terrible place for the United States to go. On the economy, Vance defended the administration's affordability record, arguing that America's inflation problem was not created in a day and that rebuilding the foundation of the middle-class economy would take time. Turning to the Western Hemisphere. President Trump announced last week what he called the biggest oil deal in world history, securing majority U.S. control of more than sixty-five billion barrels of proven oil reserves in Venezuela. The deal follows the American raid on Venezuela and the removal of its president in January, after which Washington effectively took control of the country's oil industry. Under the arrangement, the Pentagon's Office of Strategic Capital takes a thirty-five percent stake in a company run by Venezuelan oilman Alejandro Betancourt López, who is currently under investigation in Switzerland and Spain for money laundering and tax fraud. The U.S. is guaranteed twenty percent of the oil at production cost, first refusal on the rest, and veto power over the company's board. As Ted Snider writes for The American Conservative, the administration is selling this as relief for American drivers, with the Strategic Petroleum Reserve at its lowest level since 1982. But Snider cites Miguel Tinker Salas of Pomona College, who says the only immediate output would come from mature fields still requiring millions in fresh investment, while other fields would take billions and years to produce. Economist Francisco Rodríguez calculates that the promised tax revenues amount to just three dollars and twenty-two cents per barrel, less than five percent of the current price. Snider also notes that Venezuela's constitution treats oil resources as the inalienable public domain, raising legal questions
