On Monday night, MS NOW's The Rachel Maddow Show blamed the security breach of Britain’s military base on President Trump, despite Iranian efforts to thwart outside involvement in the war. In addition to alluding to the President’s ongoing conflict with Iran driving up prices, Maddow even suggested the administration was leaving Americans vulnerable to an Iranian terrorist attack here at home.
Maddow delved into her speech with the recent security threat of the British military base in Gloucestershire, England. Described by the British government as, “a major threat,” the airfield, which housed American B-1 bombers, was unsuccessfully penetrated:
The British government activated its COBRA protocols for major national security incidents, and as the news started to break here and worldwide about this situation in Great Britain, there was a lot of discussion about Iran's threats from earlier this year, their threats to any country providing help to the United States in Trump's war in Iran.
Having pointed out the obvious hike in prices that come from war, Maddow began to fantasize about a potential Iranian danger entering U.S. territory, and whether or not Americans have, “really adequately grappled,” with the cost of such a war:
Is it a cost that's not just going to be measured in lives lost and people injured and buildings destroyed, and facilities and aircraft and equipment destroyed, and the shuttering of the Strait of Hormuz and all the other oil transit routes and infrastructure that have driven your gas and diesel prices and fertilizer prices to all time record highs. The multi-billion dollar cost just of anti-aircraft munitions alone, let alone all the other missiles and materiel we have expended in this war.
Following her rant about the very reason Trump and his administration want to make an advantageous deal with Iran, Maddow left her audience with the eerie notion that the U.S. could be under a potential threat if a deal was not made soon. Maddow warned her audience that if a small town in the Cotswolds could play host to a possible danger, what is stopping something from happening in an American town:
On top of all those costs, which we have barely grappled with, this still developing strange story at this rural air base in the Cotswolds in England, it also raises this very uncomfortable question for us Americans as to whether there's an additional cost of this war. Which might be an additional risk for us here at home of potential retaliatory violence against us by Iran or its proxies or its sympathizers.
“And to get specific in terms of our ability to handle those potential kinds of threats here at home, of course, it would be the FBI that would be the agency on point there. Well, now we've learned that the Trump administration just removed from his job the top person in charge of that,” Maddow warned.
Maddow stoked fear that the administration had heartlessly left American out to dry by removing a couple FBI counterterrorism officials. “But both of those senior counterterrorism agents are now gone. They have been suddenly removed from their jobs right in the middle of this Iran war and right in the middle of all the Iran war still unfolding consequences,” she said.
Despite the three assassination attempts on Trump and the assassination of conservative commentator Charlie Kirk, Maddow scoffed at them being demoted for not taking threats to an administration official seriously enough:
And the reason they have been taken off the job, the reason they're gone is reportedly because they were not sufficiently responsive to Stephen Miller's wife. What? Stephen Miller, you know, his wife, used to also work for the White House. She's now a right-wing podcaster. Stephen Miller's wife reportedly received phone calls that were upsetting to her. And I'm very sorry to hear that. That's terrible. But the FBI was asked to investigate those calls, specifically the counterterrorism part of the FBI was asked to investigate those phone calls. Really?
MS Now might not care about the lives of administration officials, but the FBI should.
The transcript is below. Click "expand" to read:
MS NOW’s The Rachel Maddow Show
September 28, 2026
09:00:44 p.m. Eastern(...)
RACHEL MADDOW: We are watching developments tonight in a strange story out of Great Britain involving an airfield there, a military air base that the U.S. military has been using for its B-1 bombers in support of Trump's war in Iran.
This weekend, Saturday night after midnight, a local resident who lives nearby that base, a farmer from one of the small towns near this military base in rural Gloucestershire, England. She called police in the middle of the night after she said she basically stumbled across a bunch of young men and a bunch of white vans that were all right near that military base for no apparent reason in the middle of the night.
Police responded, and whatever they thought was going on there, they ended up evacuating dozens of nearby homes. They brought in a bomb disposal robot to get into the vans and go through them. This was described by the British government as “a major incident.” The British government activated its COBRA protocols for major national security incidents, and as the news started to break here and worldwide about this situation in Great Britain, there was a lot of discussion about Iran's threats from earlier this year, their threats to any country providing help to the United States in Trump's war in Iran.
This summer, in late July, for example, Iran told the U.K. explicitly that if any British base was used by the U.S. military for this war against Iran, that would make that base in the U.K. a legitimate military target for Iran. Iran issued that threat in July. Because of that threat, because of that context, when we learned in today's news that five young men had been arrested and those vans were seized outside the gates of this rural air base, well, there was, for obvious reasons, lots and lots of speculation about who these five young men might be, and what this might have all been about.
Lots of speculation, lots of worry, and then lots of head scratching. When it was announced this afternoon that all five of the people who had been arrested were let go. They were all released on bail. And we really do not know what this was about. All five men who were arrested and then let go are said to be British nationals. They're all from London. We don't know anything about what they were allegedly doing at this base or what their motivations might have been.
We have been watching this story closely all day today and tonight, trying to learn more about what exactly happened here. For example, even after they let those guys go, it wasn't until late this afternoon our time that local residents were finally allowed to go back to their homes. It's really interesting story, really intriguing. We've been watching it closely, and we'll let you know as we learn more.
But for us here in the United States, it raises an important question about the cost of Trump's war in Iran. Raises the question as to, you know, whether the cost of Trump's war in Iran is something that we've really adequately grappled with. Is it a cost that's not just going to be measured in lives lost and people injured and buildings destroyed, and facilities and aircraft and equipment destroyed, and the shuttering of the Strait of Hormuz and all the other oil transit routes and infrastructure that have driven your gas and diesel prices and fertilizer prices to all time record highs. The multi-billion dollar cost just of anti-aircraft munitions alone, let alone all the other missiles and materiel we have expended in this war.
On top of all those costs, which we have barely grappled with, this still developing strange story at this rural air base in the Cotswolds in England, it also raises this very uncomfortable question for us Americans as to whether there's an additional cost of this war. Which might be an additional risk for us here at home of potential retaliatory violence against us by Iran or its proxies or its sympathizers.
And to get specific in terms of our ability to handle those potential kinds of threats here at home, of course, it would be the FBI that would be the agency on point there.
Well, now we've learned that the Trump administration just removed from his job the top person in charge of that. The counterterrorism chief at the FBI's Washington field office, which is responsible for defending the U.S. from terrorist threats emanating from the Middle East. Specifically, the counterterrorism special agent in charge at the Washington field office, was apparently just removed from his post, along with his top deputy at that field office.
Both of those senior counterterrorism officials, the senior counterterrorism people in the FBI for defending us here at home from terrorist threats emanating in the Middle East, these two people have decades of experience. They're both highly decorated for their FBI counterterrorism work. The deputy who was just removed was the person reportedly who supervised the FBI response to the Boston marathon bombing.
But both of those senior counterterrorism agents are now gone. They have been suddenly removed from their jobs right in the middle of this Iran war and right in the middle of all the Iran war still unfolding consequences. And the reason they have been taken off the job, the reason they're gone is reportedly because they were not sufficiently responsive to Stephen Miller's wife.
What?
Stephen Miller, you know, his wife, used to also work for the White House. She's now a right-wing podcaster. Stephen Miller's wife reportedly received phone calls that were upsetting to her. And I'm very sorry to hear that. That's terrible. But the FBI was asked to investigate those calls, specifically the counterterrorism part of the FBI was asked to investigate those phone calls. Really?
(…)
