US President Donald Trump publicly rebuked his commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, after Lutnick erroneously told CNBC that no Americans had been killed in the ongoing US-Israel war against Iran — a claim directly contradicted by the Pentagon's count of 18 US service members dead since the conflict began. Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform that Lutnick had "Venezuela on his mind" when he made the statement, suggesting his secretary confused the Iran campaign with a separate US operation in Venezuela, where forces captured President Nicolás Maduro in January with no American fatalities. The gaffe has drawn attention to broader tensions in how the White House is framing the conflict, which has cost an estimated $37.5 billion, generated mounting Iranian civilian casualties — including deaths at a wedding ceremony near the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz (a waterway through which a significant share of the world's oil passes) — and drawn disapproval from 54% of Americans in recent polling.