Trump told the morning show Fox & Friends on Tuesday that he had wanted to kill Assad in 2017, but his then Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis was against the move.
“I would have rather taken him out. I had him all set,” Trump said.
“Trump's admission of such a step confirms that the US administration is a rogue... state,” Syria's Foreign Ministry said in a Wednesday statement carried by state news agency SANA.
"It pursues the same tactics as terrorist groups such as murder and assassination."
Trump's Tuesday remarks contradicted his 2018 comments in which he denied that killing Assad had even been contemplated.