President Donald Trump speaks after signing an executive order regarding a task force on fraud in the Oval Office of the White House on Monday in Washington.
WASHINGTON — Twice on Monday, President Donald Trump said he'd wrangled a confession of sorts from an Oval Office predecessor who he said had expressed regret in a private conversation about not attacking Iran the way Trump has been doing for more than two weeks.
But there's just a little problem: Representatives for the four living former presidents — three Democrats and one Republican — said none have been in touch with Trump recently.
Trump declined to name the former president when reporters asked who it was, saying he didn't want to “embarrass him.”
The Republican president first told the story during extended remarks about the Iran war as he opened a meeting of the board of trustees of the Kennedy Center. Trump is chairman of the board and held the meeting at the White House.
He repeated that Iran had been a threat to the United States for decades but said he is the only president who had the courage to do something about it.
“Look, for 47 years, no president was willing to do what I’m doing, and they should have done it a long time ago," he said. "It would have been a lot easier. There’s no president that wanted to do it.
“And yet every president knew. I’ve spoken to a certain president, who I like, actually, a past president, a former president. He said, 'I wish I did it, I wish I did,’ but they didn’t do it. I’m doing it,” Trump continued.
Asked which former president he'd spoken to, Trump said: “I can’t tell you that. I don’t want to embarrass him. It would be very bad for his career, even though he’s got no career.”
Representatives for each of former Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Joe Biden said they had not spoken with Trump recently. The individuals spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to discuss the former presidents' private conversations.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment after being informed that none of the former presidents said he had spoken with Trump recently.
Trump and all four past presidents were last together in the same space for his inauguration on Jan. 20, 2025 — well before the war.
He has been extremely critical of Biden and Obama, often saying Biden is the “worst president in the history of our country" and accusing Obama of negotiating a “horrible deal” with Iran over its nuclear weapons. Trump withdrew the U.S. from that agreement the first time he was president.
But the Republican recently offered sympathetic comments about Clinton, saying it "bothers” him that the former president had been called to give a deposition to Congress about his friendship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Former President Bill Clinton speaks during the Public Homegoing Service for the Rev. Jesse Jackson at the House of Hope on Friday in Chicago.
“I liked Bill Clinton. I still like Bill Clinton,” Trump said in a Feb. 4 interview with NBC News. “I liked his behavior toward me. I thought he got me, he understood me.”
Trump repeated his story about discussing Iran with a former president later Monday in the Oval Office, where he announced that Vice President JD Vance will lead a task force that was created to eliminate fraud in federal benefit programs.
“Was it George W. Bush?” a reporter asked.
“No,” Trump said.
“Was it Bill Clinton?” the reporter asked.
Trump said: “I don’t want to say. I don’t want to say,” then added that “it's somebody that happens to like me. And I like that person, who's a smart person. But that person said, ‘I wish I did it,’ OK, but I don't want to get into who, OK. I don't want to get them into trouble.”
Photos from Middle East in the 2nd week of the Iran war
U.S. embassy personnel inspect the damage caused by a bombing in Baghdad, Saturday, March 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban)
A woman sits on rubble across from a residential building damaged last Sunday during the U.S.-Israeli air campaign in Tehran, Iran, Thursday, March 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
Residents inspect damage which according to them was caused by fragments of an intercepted Iranian rocket that landed on a Palestinian three story building, in West Bank town of Biddya, west of Salfit, Wednesday, March 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed)
Smoke rise from an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, Beirut's southern suburbs, at sunset in Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
A boy runs inside cement pipe turned into a bomb shelter as air raid sirens warn of incoming Iranian missile strike in Michmoret, Israel, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
Smoke rise from an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, Beirut's southern suburbs, Monday, March 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
A man passes in front of a destroyed building that housed a branch of Al-Qard Al-Hassan, a non-bank financial institution run by Hezbollah, which was hit by an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, Beirut's southern suburbs, Lebanon, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
People walk past closed shops at the nearly empty traditional main bazaar in Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
Motorbikes drive past a billboard depicting Iran’s late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, center, handing the country’s flag to his son and successor Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, right, as the late revolutionary founder Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini stands at left, in a square in downtown Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
Flames rise after an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh Beirut's southern suburbs, Monday, March 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
A man holds a poster of Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, the successor to his late father Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as supreme leader, during a rally to support him in Tehran, Iran, Monday, March 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
People wave Iranian flags as they hold posters of the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, showing him at different ages, during a rally to support his son Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, who succeeds his father as the new supreme leader, in Tehran, Iran, Monday, March 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
People gather in a rally to support Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, the successor to his late father Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as supreme leader, in Tehran, Iran, Monday, March 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
The coffin of Mehdi Hosseini, a man killed in a U.S.-Israeli strike, is carried for burial at Behesht-e Zahra cemetery in Tehran, Iran, Monday, March 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
A girl displaced by Israeli airstrikes, looks on at a school used as a shelter in Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, March 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
Relatives mourn over the flag draped coffin of Mehdi Hosseini who was killed in a U.S.-Israeli strike during his burial ceremony at Behesht-e Zahra cemetery in Tehran, Iran, Monday, March 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
Israeli security forces and ZAKA rescue service members carry the body of a man killed in an Iranian missile strike in Yehud, Israel, Monday, March 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Two women from the Iranian Red Crescent Society stand as a thick plume of smoke from a U.S.-Israeli strike on an oil storage facility late Saturday rises in the sky in Tehran, Iran, Sunday, March 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
A woman walks past a cordoned-off area damaged during an Iranian strike in Tel Aviv, Israel, Sunday, March 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Mourners carry the bodies of Hezbollah fighters who were killed by Israeli airstrikes during their funeral procession in Khraibeh village, eastern Lebanon, Sunday, March 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Residents look on and take pictures as flames and smoke rise from an oil storage facility struck as attacks hit the city during the U.S.–Israeli military campaign in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, March 7, 2026. (Alireza Sotakbar/ISNA via AP)
Residents flee the site of an Israeli airstrike that hit an apartment building in the southern port city of Sidon, Lebanon, Friday, March 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
A cleric chants slogans during the annual anti-Israeli Quds Day, or Jerusalem Day rally in support of Palestinians in Tehran, Iran, Friday, March 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
People inspect the site of a destroyed branch of Al-Qard Al-Hassan, a non-bank financial institution run by Hezbollah, which was hit by an Israeli airstrike in central Beirut, Thursday, March 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
An Israeli army strike explodes next to a tent camp after residents were given a warning to evacuate before the strike in Gaza City, Wednesday, March 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Yousef Al Zanoun)
A woman gathers belongings from her family's home after it was damaged by a projectile launched from Lebanon, in Haniel, central Israel, Thursday, March 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Baz Ratner)
Israeli authorities inspect homes damaged by a projectile launched from Lebanon, in Haniel, central Israel, Thursday, March 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Baz Ratner)
Smoke and flames rise from buildings following an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, Beirut's southern suburbs, Lebanon, Wednesday, March 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Rescue workers gather at the site where Israeli airstrikes hit apartments in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, March 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
People take cover in an underground bomb shelter as air raid sirens warn of incoming Iranian missile strike, in Ramat Gan, Israel, Wednesday, March 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty)
Smoke rises from buildings following an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, Beirut's southern suburbs, Lebanon, Wednesday, March 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
A man walks along the shore as oil tankers and cargo ships line up in the Strait of Hormuz, as seen from Khor Fakkan, United Arab Emirates, Wednesday, March 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri)
Residents look on and take pictures as flames and smoke rise from an oil storage facility struck as attacks hit the city during the U.S.–Israeli military campaign in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, March 7, 2026. (Alireza Sotakbar/ISNA via AP)
A man stands atop the rubble as smoke rises from a building destroyed in an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, Beirut's southern suburbs, Lebanon, Saturday, March 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
Rescue workers inspect an apartment damaged in an Israeli airstrike as thick smoke fills the building in the southern port city of Sidon, Lebanon, Saturday, March 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Mohammad Zaatari)
A girl walks inside a cement pipe turned into a bomb shelter as air raid sirens warn of incoming Iranian missile strike in Michmoret, Israel, Saturday, March 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
Fire and plumes of smoke rise from an oil facility in Fujairah, United Arab Emirates, Saturday, March 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri)
