Good evening. Once again, I am Stephanie Ruhl, and welcome to the nightcap. We are 234 days away from the midterms and heading into the third week of the war with Iran, a war that has cost the American taxpayer over $11 billion in the first week alone.

According to the Pentagon estimates, the conflict

has also caused the deaths of thousands of people, including several American servicemen and women.

As the U.S. and Israel continued their bombing campaigns, Iran has retaliated with missiles and

drone strikes across the entire region while blocking, and this is hugely important,

the Strait of Formuz, a vital shipping channel for a fifth of the world's oil. The war has sent

energy prices soaring, and across the globe, people are feeling the effects, including here

on U.S. soil. And now, of course, there is new reporting that the Pentagon plans to move more

Marines and warships into the region. Let's bring in our nightcap. It is an excellent one. My colleague

and friend, Catherine Rampel, she's the co-host of the evening edition of the weekend and the

economics editor for the Bullwark. Now, Your Huck joins us. Former White House Senior Director

and former State Department Senior Advisor. She's

now the assistant dean for Syracuse Maxwell School in D.C. Christina Greer joins us,

Associate Professor of Political Science at Fordham University and Sammy Sage, co-founder of

Betches and author of Democracy in Retrograde. Ladies, there's a lot for us to cover.

Now, the Wall Street Journal is reporting or they're citing that three U.S. officials, as their sources, are telling us that more Marines and more warships are heading to the region. At the same time, we keep hearing, they're wrapping this up. They want this over. This doesn't sound like a wind down to me. No, no, and the story, the rhetoric is not matching the reality on the ground, because we're

clearly not winning either. It's very unclear what the objectives are, what the goals are.

Trump says that he wants to get out sooner rather than later and wrap this up in days.

But I have family member in the Air Force who had to cancel a wedding in June because he's

expecting and anticipating a deployment.

So to get people out and back takes time. And these are the realities of what our armed

folks in the arms forces have to deal with. And it's not just the reality that lives in Trump's

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