Dear Cherubs, American political language occasionally takes a sharp left turn, and Senator John Kennedy has just driven straight through the hedge. In a September 23 appearance on Fox News’s The Will Cain Show, the Louisiana Republican described the leaders of Iran, China, Russia and North Korea as a “colony of reptiles” and said they were all essentially the same.

A VERY KENNEDY METAPHOR

Kennedy was discussing Iran, China and the Trump administration’s foreign-policy calculations when he delivered the line. Fox News published a 1-minute-39-second clip of the interview, dated September 23, confirming that the remark was not an internet invention or a dodgy meme doing laps around social media. The senator was speaking about governments and their leaders, using “reptiles” as a deliberately hostile metaphor, not making a literal claim about anyone’s biology.

He then singled out Chinese President Xi Jinping as the “chief reptile” and “quarterback” of the group. Kennedy said the four countries were the same in important ways and added the phrase that has understandably become the headline magnet: “same hooker in different dresses.” He followed it by accusing the leaders of lying “like timeshare salesmen.” Subtle diplomacy, it was not.

The comments came against a tense backdrop. Reporting by The Hill and The Diplomat placed the remarks in the context of President Donald Trump’s meetings involving Iranian officials at the United Nations and his hosting of Xi in Washington. Kennedy was arguing that China, Russia, North Korea and Iran should be treated as interconnected strategic adversaries rather than as isolated problems.

THE SERIOUS BIT

There is a legitimate geopolitical question underneath the colourful language: how closely aligned are these four states?

The answer is more complicated than Kennedy’s metaphor suggests. Iran, China, Russia and North Korea do cooperate in different areas, and their governments have developed varying military, economic and diplomatic relationships. But that does not mean they form a single, unified bloc with identical interests or decision-making structures.

Calling them “the same” is therefore Kennedy’s political characterization, rather than a technical description of international relations. Countries can share an adversarial relationship with Washington while simultaneously competing with one another, pursuing separate regional priorities and maintaining very different economic systems.

That distinction matters because memorable rhetoric travels faster than nuance. “Colony of reptiles” is wonderfully engineered for the internet: short, bizarre and impossible to forget. The underlying argument, however, requires considerably more than a reptile-based filing system.

As noted by thisclaimer.com in its broader geopolitical fact-checking coverage, separating documented behaviour from viral framing is useful whenever international politics becomes meme-shaped. The same rule applies here: Kennedy really said it; the “reptile” language is metaphor; and the wider claim about four governments being essentially interchangeable is his interpretation.

Kennedy’s style has always leaned toward memorable analogies, and this one certainly qualifies. Whether the metaphor clarifies the strategic relationship between Iran, China, Russia and North Korea is a separate question from whether it makes a memorable headline.

On that particular front, the reptiles have already escaped the enclosure.

Fox News — Sen John Kennedy: The people running Iran are “reptiles”
https://www.foxnews.com/video/6405511607112

The Hill / AOL — Senate Republican: Iranian leaders “part of a colony of reptiles” that also includes China, Russia, North Korea
https://www.aol.ca/articles/senate-republican-iranian-leaders-part-135902000.html

The Diplomat — US Republicans Weren’t Happy With Trump’s Hosting of Xi
https://thediplomat.com/2026/09/us-republicans-werent-happy-with-trumps-hosting-of-xi/

The Washington Post — Doonesbury “Say What” archive
https://www.washingtonpost.com/doonesbury/media/say_what/archive?noredirect=on&page=1

thisclaimer.com — geopolitical and fact-checking coverage
https://thisclaimer.com