Megyn Kelly on claims that Iran war is worth higher gas prices: "It's fucking propaganda, and it's not going to sell" | Media Matters for America

Megyn Kelly on claims that Iran war is worth higher gas prices: "It's fucking propaganda, and it's not going to sell"

May 1, 2026

From the May 1, 2026, edition of SiriusXM's The Megyn Kelly Show

MEGYN KELLY (HOST): The Iran war is in a weird place right now. There's a ceasefire, but the president reportedly has just been advised on some options to, like, rattle the ceasefire out of a ceasefire and to an end to the actual conflict. And he is reportedly considering renewed strikes against certain targets or something greater. So some plans have been brought to him.

But meantime, domestically, gas prices now have hit — oil has rallied to its highest level since the start of the Iran war, and gas prices are now averaging $4.3 a gallon, which Trump was asked about in the following sound bite, which we will play. Watch here, SOT 11.

(CLIP BEGINS)

REPORTER: The average price of a gallon of gas is now $4.30 in this country.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And you know what? And we're not going to have a nuclear weapon in the hands of Iran.

REPORTER: But what —

TRUMP: The gas will go down as soon as the war's over, it'll drop like a rock. There's so much of it. It's all over the place, sitting all over the oceans of the world. And it'll be -- it'll go down. But what won't happen is if Iran had a nuclear weapon and used it, then the whole world is a different place —

(CROSSTALK)

REPORTER: What about the midterms, how do you think Republicans —

TRUMP: You're not going to have to pay a little bit more for gasoline. The gasoline, the oil will go down rapidly as soon as the war is over.

(CLIP ENDS)

KELLY: OK, and by the way, just want to correct myself, that was yesterday. Today, they've already gone off an up another 10 cents to $4 and almost 40 cents a barrel. It's $4.39 that the average gallon is costing.

So there is President Trump saying that. Here's Sen. Rick Scott, a Republican doubling down with Kaitlan Collins, SOT 12.

(CLIP BEGINS)

KAITLAN COLLINS (REPORTER): When the people are unhappy about paying 1.24 or more, what do you tell them about how long they're going to be paying more for gas?

SEN. RICK SCOTT (R-FL): Well, you know, as you and you know, Kaitlan, my background, I grew up in public housing, and I watched my parents struggle for food and struggle for jobs. So I think gas prices, you know, I hate them going up. But here's what's fascinating. I mean, Democrats don't care about high gas prices. They tried to cause it to make sure we all buy electric vehicles. Trump's tried to get gas prices down. He did his first term. He's done it this term. But there's a trade off right now. I want — I want my family, your family to be safe. And is there a cost right now? It's terrible that we have higher prices, but the trade off is we're going to live in freedom and democracy and we don't have somebody a lunatic that's gonna drop a nuclear weapon on us.

...

(CLIP ENDS)

KELLY: OK. I'm sorry. I just — I'm taking this before I give it to you. That's fucking bullshit. The intelligence community assessed that Iran was not anywhere near getting a nuclear bomb. That comes from President Trump's intelligence community right before we launched this war. President Trump himself said that we had obliterated the nuclear sites in June, which we believed and reported and congratulated him on.

So this is just bullshit. You can say Iran's a bad actor. Iran has proxies who are doing bad things in the region. Iran has designs on hurting America. That's all true. But what he just said is a lie. It's bullshit. It's fucking propaganda, and it's not going to sell. People don't believe it.

And that is why the president's poll numbers on approval for this war continue to drop into the basement. And approval of the war is in the basement as well. The latest poll just came out, and two thirds of the American public are against it. Two thirds of the American public are against the war. The gas prices, Buck, I just — you tell me whether America's going to swallow, we just need to do it in order to prevent a nuclear weapon from dropping on our heads.