Rep. Ted Lieu of California confronted U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz during a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing, arguing that President Trump’s past claims about Iran’s military being destroyed have been contradicted by continued American casualties.
“U.S. troops are dying because of Trump’s lies,” Lieu wrote on X, sharing a clip of his exchange with Waltz.
The exchange took place during a July 22 House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on United Nations accountability and reform, where Waltz testified alongside Jeff Bartos, the U.S. representative to the UN for management and reform, on a range of topics including the Iran war, antisemitism, a two-state solution between Israel and Palestine, and China’s influence at the UN.
“On March 16th, President Trump stated that Iran’s military was, quote, ‘literally obliterated,’ end quote,” Lieu said, according to the hearing footage. “You need to explain to American people how an Iranian military that’s been purportedly obliterated killed 18 U.S. service members and wounded 482 service members.”
Waltz responded by noting that a portion of the American death toll stemmed from an accident rather than direct Iranian fire. “As you know, seven of those service members died in a plane crash,” Waltz said.
Lieu continued his questioning, describing footage of an Iranian strike on a U.S. base in Jordan. “And has struck multiple U.S. facilities in the Middle East repeatedly,” Lieu said. “So I’m gonna show you a video from Jordan, and this is an Iranian strike. It showed multiple missiles hitting this base in Jordan. It was disclosed later that two U.S. troops died in that strike from a purportedly obliterated Iranian military.”
The crash Waltz referenced occurred on March 12, when a U.S. Air Force KC-135 Stratotanker refueling aircraft went down in western Iraq during a mission supporting the broader military campaign against Iran, which the Pentagon has designated Operation Epic Fury. Officials said the incident, which took place in what the military described as “friendly” airspace and involved another aircraft that landed safely, was not caused by hostile or friendly fire and remained under investigation.
The Pentagon publicly identified six service members killed in the crash, one fewer than the seven Waltz cited in his response to Lieu: Maj. John “Alex” Klinner, 33, of Auburn, Alabama; Capt. Ariana G. Savino, 31, of Covington, Washington; Tech. Sgt. Ashley B. Pruitt, 34, of Bardstown, Kentucky; Capt. Seth R. Koval, 38, of Mooresville, Indiana; Capt. Curtis J. Angst, 30, of Wilmington, Ohio; and Tech. Sgt. Tyler H. Simmons, 28, of Columbus, Ohio. Klinner, Savino and Pruitt were assigned to the 6th Air Refueling Wing at MacDill Air Force Base in Florida, while Koval, Angst and Simmons were assigned to the 121st Air Refueling Wing at Rickenbacker Air National Guard Base in Ohio.
Trump made the “literally obliterated” comment during remarks at a Kennedy Center board meeting on March 16, saying at the time that “the air force is gone, the navy is gone,” and separately telling reporters that same day, “In two weeks we have decimated them.” He made similar claims throughout March, saying the U.S. had “destroyed 100% of Iran’s military capability” and that the country’s navy was “now at the bottom of the sea,” with “44 ships” wiped out and “every plane” destroyed.
Independent fact-checkers have repeatedly disputed the completeness of those claims. A PolitiFact analysis found that despite Trump’s statements, Iran continued to fire drones and missiles throughout the conflict, and cited experts who said the country had not been militarily defeated. When contacted for that analysis, a White House spokesperson said Iranian ballistic missile attacks had decreased 90 percent and drone attacks were down 95 percent since the war’s start, while acknowledging Iran’s missile and air defense systems remained only “heavily degraded” rather than eliminated.
Waltz was confirmed as the 32nd U.S. Representative to the United Nations in a 47-43 Senate vote in September 2025, after serving as Trump’s national security adviser earlier that year, a post he left in May 2025 after mistakenly adding a journalist to a private Signal chat involving sensitive military planning. He previously represented Florida in the House, where he served on the Armed Services, Foreign Affairs and Intelligence committees.
Lieu, who sits on the House Foreign Affairs and Judiciary committees and serves as Vice Chair of the House Democratic Caucus, is a veteran of the U.S. Air Force who retired from the Reserve in 2021 with the rank of colonel.
The exchange followed a Pentagon casualty update earlier in the week confirming that a service member killed during a controlled detonation of a downed Iranian drone in Iraq brought the total American death toll in the war to 18 since fighting with Iran began Feb. 28, with the Defense Department’s casualty tracking system also listing hundreds of additional troops injured over the course of the conflict.
Neither Waltz’s office nor the State Department has issued additional public comment on the exchange beyond his remarks during the hearing.