PoliticsDonald Trump Orders Scott Bessent Into the Situation Room During Chaotic TV Interview: Watch
President Donald Trump abruptly pulled Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent from a TV interview for an urgent Iran meeting.
March 13 2026, Published 3:19 p.m. ET
President Donald Trump abruptly ordered Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to the White House Situation Room while Bessent was in the middle of a live media interview.
The urgent summons occurred approximately 13 minutes into a conversation with Sky News' Wilfred Frost at the Treasury Department's Cash Room.
An aide interrupted the recording, saying, "The president wants you right away," and Bessent was immediately whisked away to the White House to address the ongoing conflict with Iran.
The meeting took place as the Trump administration managed the financial and geopolitical fallout of "Operation Epic Fury," a joint U.S.-Israeli military campaign against Iran that began on February 28.
Scott Bessent Returned to the Interview 2 Hours Later
Scott Bessent was pulled out of an interview.
The conflict led to a surge in oil prices above $100 a barrel after Iran's new Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, closed the Strait of Hormuz.
Bessent, a billionaire former hedge fund manager, returned to complete the interview nearly two hours later, visibly shaken but reporting that the "Iranian mission is proceeding well ahead of schedule.”
The treasury secretary said he discussed a “plethora of things” during his impromptu meeting with the president.
'The President Is in Great Spirits'
Scott Bessent praised the president in the interview.
“The president is in great spirits, the Iranian mission is proceeding well ahead of schedule,” Bessent told Frost.
He specifically praised the POTUS in the interview, which is something Trump’s cabinet is known to do often to get on his good side.
Critics of the administration have blasted Bessent as a "suave enabler" who tells the POTUS exactly what he wants to hear.
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Donald Trump needed to discuss the war with Scott Bessent.
“I can give this team my highest compliment from President Trump, to the head of the Joint Chiefs, to the secretary of war. I would trust my child’s life in their hands,” he said, revealing his teenager was considering joining the military.
Bessent, 63, then announced a "temporary authorization" to allow countries to purchase Russian oil currently stranded at sea to help stabilize global energy markets.
He also stated the U.S. Navy, possibly with an international coalition, would begin escorting oil tankers through the Strait of Hormuz "as soon as it is militarily possible.”
'Suave Enabler'
Scott Bessent has been called a 'suave enabler.'
Bessent has been a primary architect of a "maximum pressure" campaign, which he previously credited with causing a dollar shortage and bank failures within Iran prior to the military escalation.
During his remarks after the meeting, the president's money man baselessly claimed the U.S. had "complete control of the skies" and that the Iranian Navy had been "sunk literally and figuratively."
