President Donald Trump unleashed a blistering warning Monday, vowing to hunt down the source of a damaging leak that exposed a high-stakes U.S. rescue mission in hostile Iranian territory — and warning the media outlet involved to cough up the name or face jail time.

Speaking from the White House, Trump hailed what he called a pair of daring, near-miraculous recoveries of American airmen shot down over Iran — operations he insisted were meant to stay under wraps until every service member was safely accounted for.

Instead, a leak blew the lid off the mission mid-operation — and Trump made clear he’s not letting it slide.

“I want to thank every member of the U.S. Armed Forces involved in these historic operations. They really were historic. It’s just not something that’s done. And you’d understand it. Not that they don’t want to do it, but when you’re going into areas — when you look at these helicopters, when you look at the amount of bullets and everything else that they took, when you go into these areas, you don’t come out like we came out,” Trump said.

Then, invoking divine luck, he added:

“God was watching us. Well, it was Easter — we’re in Easter territory, I guess. But God was watching us. Amazing. Because when you look at the machinery, they took damage. The first thing I said is, these are unbelievable machines — how they flew back, and not even much of a problem.”

But the tone quickly turned from celebratory to combative.

Trump revealed that officials had deliberately kept the first rescue quiet while a second downed pilot was still missing — until someone spilled the beans.

“But these two extraordinary rescues — because it was two — and as you probably know, we didn’t talk about the first one for an hour. And then somebody leaked something, which we’ll hopefully find — that leaker. We’re looking very hard to find that leaker. And talked about there’s somebody missing. They basically said that we have one and there’s someone missing. Well, they didn’t know there was somebody missing until this leaker gave the information.”

“So whoever it was, we think we’ll be able to find it out, because we’re going to go to the media company that released it, and we’re gonna say national security — give it up or go to jail. And we know who — and you know who we’re talking about.”

According to Trump, the leak didn’t just break protocol — it put a target on an American’s back.

“There are some things you can’t do, because when they did that, all of a sudden the entire country of Iran knew that there was a pilot that was somewhere on their land, fighting for his life,” he said. “And it also made it much more difficult for the pilots and for the people going in to search for him.”

The fallout, he warned, was immediate and dangerous. Iranian authorities, he said, blasted out alerts and even dangled a reward for anyone who could capture the stranded pilot — effectively turning an already perilous rescue into a nationwide manhunt.

“So in addition to a hostile, very talented, very good, very evil military, we had millions of people trying to get a reward,” Trump said.

He reserved some of his harshest criticism for the unknown leaker, calling the act reckless — if not outright deranged.

“But we have to find that leaker, because that’s a sick person. Probably didn’t realize the extent of how bad it was — I can’t imagine that the person did. But we’re going to find out. It’s national security. And the person that did the story will go to jail if he doesn’t say. And that doesn’t last long. And I think everybody would understand that. They put this mission at great risk.”

The fiery remarks instantly set off a guessing game in media circles over which outlet Trump had in his crosshairs. Early reports about the initial rescue appeared to surface first on Israel’s Channel 12 before being picked up and confirmed by U.S. media.

🚨 HOLY SMOKES. President Trump just said a leaker AIDED AND ABETTED Iran, leaking to the fake news information about the search for an American airman

PRISON.

"When they did that, all of a sudden, the entire country of Iran knew that there was a pilot that was somewhere on… pic.twitter.com/jSdgBbewnl

— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) April 6, 2026