The President threatens to seize one of Iran's oil hubs.

Hon. Monday morning. The President of the United States, on a phone call to NBC News, said the United States might seize an Iranian oil hub. The exact line, hon, was we are looking at taking one of their oil hubs, just for a while. He did not name a specific hub.

CENTCOM, asked at the daily briefing on Monday afternoon which hub the President was referring to, said the command would study the matter. That, hon, is the standard CENTCOM line when the commander in chief has said something on a phone call that CENTCOM has not been briefed on.

Pause. Let me give you the list of things the President has threatened to seize from Iran in the past three weeks. He has threatened to seize the enriched uranium on day three. He has threatened to seize the regime’s leadership on day four. He has threatened to seize Iranian oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz on day twelve. He has threatened to seize Iranian power plants on day twenty. He has, on Monday, threatened to seize an oil hub.

In the same period, hon, the United States has seized: zero of those things. The enriched uranium is still in Iran. The regime’s leadership is still in Tehran. The oil tankers in the Strait are still operated by Iranian companies. The power plants are still online. The oil hubs are still oiling.

You ever notice how the people who say they are going to take it keep not taking it?

The Iranian oil hubs, hon, on the map of Iran, are at Kharg Island, at Bandar Abbas, at Asaluyeh, at Mahshahr, and at Bushehr. They are all in Iranian sovereign territory. They are all, by every standard of international law, protected by the territorial-sovereignty principle. The seizure of any one of them, hon, would be the single largest territorial seizure by an American military operation since Panama in 1989. It would, hon, transform the Iran war from an air campaign into a land war. The administration, on the fact sheet, has been insistent for three weeks that no land war is contemplated.

The threat, on Monday, hon, is the kind of threat that only works if the threatened party believes the threatener is willing to follow through. The threatened party, in this case, is Iran. Iran, hon, has spent three weeks watching the American President threaten one thing, do another thing, threaten the second thing, do nothing, threaten a third thing, and post about all three on Truth Social with no follow-up. The threatened party, by Monday morning, is probably not going to update its operational planning on the basis of Monday morning’s call to NBC News.

What is also on the public record, hon, on the same Monday afternoon, is that TSA officers are receiving back pay. The Department, under the provisional payroll accommodation, is paying out. The workers, hon, on direct deposit, on the 4 p.m. processing, are receiving the wire. That is, hon, the one good piece of news on Monday. The TSA workers are paid, in part. The lines at the airport, hon, are still long. The training you do not have when you deploy ICE to the exit lane is not made up by the back pay. The training takes four to six months. The staffing crisis will be with us for a while.

The oil hub, hon, will probably not be seized. The back pay, hon, will be eaten by the gas price the President told Kentucky was a small price to pay.

Funny how that works.