Chatter and fear about US military draft emerge as Trump’s Iran war drags on | US military
It is almost certain that the United States will not have a military draft to fight Iran. This hasn’t stopped the chatter and anxiety across the country.
In recent weeks, Donald Trump has ordered a number of marines and army paratroopers to the Middle East, hinting at a possible land war to reopen the Strait of Hormuz or secure nuclear weapons material. The provocative military activity has sparked speculative debate about what it would take to invade a country twice the population and three times the size of Iraq.
The White House has done little to end the controversy. On March 8, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt chose — seemingly offhand — to respond in vague terms to conservative journalist Maria Bartiromo’s question about the possibility of military service.
“As commander in chief, the president wants to continue to evaluate the success of this military operation. This is not part of the current plan at this time, but the president is wisely keeping his options on the table,” Leavitt told Fox News. “This president, of course, has no greater priority or responsibility than protecting the American people and our troops.”
Since the answer was not definitive, comments on the draft snowballed. News organizations such as Mission and Purpose, yahoo And USA Today published stories about how the draft would work.
Meanwhile, an influence operation run by Iranian fake accounts began amplifying comments critical of the war soon after the first US attack on Iran. Researchers at Clemson University in South Carolina crawler change in the network of fake accounts.
Social media noted a change to the Selective Service program created in the National Defense Authorization Act that Trump signed in December that automates registration for Selective Service, a program in which the government maintains a list of those eligible in the event of a draft reinstatement. Clickbait accounts began headline posts saying young men were being “automatically drafted,” but the change was merely administrative.
Americans also noted that the U.S. military revised its draft regulations on March 20, raising the maximum draft age from 35 to 42 and removing some previously imposed restrictions on those convicted of marijuana possession. The changes suggested to some that the military had a recruiting problem and that standards were being changed to address this problem. But the military met its goal of recruiting 61,000 new recruits in 2025 four months early.
“I mean, this is a free country, they can talk about it all they want,” said Lawrence Romo, a former administrator of the Selective Service System in the Obama administration. “But unless there’s a long-term problem of not being able to recruit volunteers for the volunteer forces, or there’s a war where we have no choice, I don’t think it’s serious, do you?”
Shortly after the United States launched an attack on Iran, South Park writer Toby Morton founded DraftBarronTrump.com, satirizing the president’s willingness to send others to war while his own family, including himself, studiously avoided military service by obtaining draft deferments due to bone spurs. Attention was drawn to the President’s claim that his son was too tall to be drafted. As of March 2, the hashtag #SendBarron was trending on X and TikTok.
As draft conversations flooded social media, Politico asked California governor Gavin Newsom about it. “I think we need to look at ways to frame the responsibility to serve for at least six months, so a year, 18 months,” Newsom, a Democrat, said in a video interview published March 24. “This concept of shared experiences; I don’t know how else we can bring this country together.”
Newsom never served in the military. Actor and comedian Rob Schneider, who called on every American in
But even in the conversations around the draft, Trump has political responsibility. During the 2024 campaign, Trump harshly rejected the draft idea.
“The Fake News Washington Post floated the ridiculous idea that Donald J. Trump would call for Military Service,” Trump said. wrote In a June 11, 2024 post on Truth Social questioning comments made to the Washington Post by Christopher Miller, who led the Department of Defense after Mike Esper left after the 2020 election.
“The story is completely false. In fact, I never even thought of the idea.”
