President Donald Trump is signaling he’s ready to wrap up the US war with Iran, even as details of a deal remain murky and hurdles to a lasting peace remain high.
The president has kept his criteria and timeline for ending the war ambiguous over the seven weeks since the US joined Israel in launching attacks against the Middle Eastern oil producer.
Also Read: US extends waiver allowing India and other countries to buy Russian oil
In interviews and social media posts on Friday, Trump indicated talks had yielded the outline of an agreement that was close enough — underlining his desire to conclude the war and move on to a domestic agenda ahead of the November midterm elections.
“Iran has agreed to never close the Strait of Hormuz again,” he said on his Truth Social platform, in one of many declarations that have not been confirmed by Iran itself. Tehran has said the area, through which 20% of global oil supplies flow, would stay open during a ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon.
On Wall Street, traders rushed to bet that the conflict was all but over. The S&P 500 rallied to an all-time high, the dollar on Friday briefly erased all of its war-fueled gains and oil fell to around $90 a barrel.
With the elections nearing, domestic political pressure could be weighing on the president to end the hostilities.
The war has led to a spike in gasoline prices, undermining a favorite talking point from Trump, who likes to claim credit for bringing down fuel costs. Voters have shown a propensity for punishing incumbent parties over inflation.
Though Trump’s political base has largely supported the war effort, polls show a majority of Americans do not.
If Republicans lose control of one or both chambers of Congress to Democrats, the remainder of Trump’s presidency risks transforming into a slog of bitter funding battles and investigations.
In a sign the White House recognizes the need to shift the national conversation, Trump has spent much of the week attempting to champion the benefits of his signature tax law, from welcoming a McDonald’s-toting gig worker to the Oval Office to visiting Nevada and Arizona to highlight his economic agenda and motivate young voters.
“To be honest, it was a little tacky. You know, they come up with these crazy ideas,” Trump said Thursday of his DoorDash delivery to the White House. “They’re a little tiny embarrassing, but we do them and you win by landslides.”
Trump’s advisers earlier in the year had previewed a spring of domestic politically focused travel, but that plan was put on hold because of the war.
Herculean Effort
Trump has at various times said he wanted to permanently end Iran’s nuclear ambitions, secure its highly enriched uranium, end its support for terror proxies in the region, obliterate its drone and ballistic missile programs, ensure the flow of goods through the Strait of Hormuz, and achieve regime change.
So far, the war has partially yielded some of those outcomes and left others unfulfilled.
Also Read: Trump says Iran deal to remain under blockade until "100% complete and fully signed"
Trump said in a phone interview on Friday that Iran had agreed to suspend its nuclear program indefinitely, in what appeared to be a new concession that Tehran has yet to verify. In negotiations that faltered before the war began and resumed again last weekend in Islamabad, US officials said Iran had declined to end its uranium enrichment.
Making things more complicated, Trump may come under immense pressure, including from some right-leaning members of his own party, not to end the conflict without clear progress on preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear bomb.
Read more: Trump Says Iran Will Suspend Nuclear Program as Hormuz Reopens
It will take a herculean effort to achieve that goal. Former President Barack Obama’s previous Iran agreement, which Trump abandoned, took more than a year and a half to negotiate. Trump was highly critical of Obama’s financial concessions in the original Iran nuclear deal, meaning that unfrozen assets, lifted sanctions, or allowing Tehran to toll ships through Hormuz could all cause blowback from national-security hawks.
On Friday, he insisted he would not release any funds to Iran. But the outlines of a new, Trump-blessed agreement could look similar to the one he threw away.
While the White House has not announced a date or location for the next round of formal talks, the Wall Street Journal reported that the US believes they are likely to take place on Monday in Pakistan. Trump told Bloomberg he had not yet settled on a delegation for those talks, but was considering dispatching some combination of Vice President JD Vance, special envoy Steve Witkoff, and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner; the president said he could personally travel to Islamabad to finalize an agreement.
“Most of the main points are finalized. It’ll go pretty quickly,” Trump said.
Trump has painted himself as a transformational leader and portrayed the attack on Iran as the culmination of a conflict that has built up for decades without action by his predecessors. But throughout the war, he’s veered from bombastic language threatening an end to Persian civilization to expressing optimism about peace. Trump told ABC News on Friday he thought a deal is in reach because he could now trust the Iranians.
“I think they’ve had enough,” he said.
On the Treadmill
Despite his optimistic, albeit vague, language on Friday, the president said a US blockade of the Strait of Hormuz would stay in place until a deal with Iran was secured.
“I think he is aware of the need to keep the pressure on till he has something in hand,” said David Hale, who served as Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs during Trump’s first term. Hale said combined military, political and economic pressure would be needed for the US to prevail.
Speaking to reporters later Friday in Arizona, the president said negotiations would continue through the weekend.
“There are parallels to what we’ve done in the past,” said Richard Nephew, a former State Department official now at Columbia University, referring to early descriptions of a potential deal. “If what this amounts to is the president is just sort of washing his hands, ‘I’ve solved the nuclear problem, now we’re done here,’ then we are still on the treadmill.”
The president has kept his criteria and timeline for ending the war ambiguous over the seven weeks since the US joined Israel in launching attacks against the Middle Eastern oil producer.
Also Read: US extends waiver allowing India and other countries to buy Russian oil
In interviews and social media posts on Friday, Trump indicated talks had yielded the outline of an agreement that was close enough — underlining his desire to conclude the war and move on to a domestic agenda ahead of the November midterm elections.
“Iran has agreed to never close the Strait of Hormuz again,” he said on his Truth Social platform, in one of many declarations that have not been confirmed by Iran itself. Tehran has said the area, through which 20% of global oil supplies flow, would stay open during a ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon.
On Wall Street, traders rushed to bet that the conflict was all but over. The S&P 500 rallied to an all-time high, the dollar on Friday briefly erased all of its war-fueled gains and oil fell to around $90 a barrel.
With the elections nearing, domestic political pressure could be weighing on the president to end the hostilities.
The war has led to a spike in gasoline prices, undermining a favorite talking point from Trump, who likes to claim credit for bringing down fuel costs. Voters have shown a propensity for punishing incumbent parties over inflation.
Though Trump’s political base has largely supported the war effort, polls show a majority of Americans do not.
If Republicans lose control of one or both chambers of Congress to Democrats, the remainder of Trump’s presidency risks transforming into a slog of bitter funding battles and investigations.
In a sign the White House recognizes the need to shift the national conversation, Trump has spent much of the week attempting to champion the benefits of his signature tax law, from welcoming a McDonald’s-toting gig worker to the Oval Office to visiting Nevada and Arizona to highlight his economic agenda and motivate young voters.
“To be honest, it was a little tacky. You know, they come up with these crazy ideas,” Trump said Thursday of his DoorDash delivery to the White House. “They’re a little tiny embarrassing, but we do them and you win by landslides.”
Trump’s advisers earlier in the year had previewed a spring of domestic politically focused travel, but that plan was put on hold because of the war.
Herculean Effort
Trump has at various times said he wanted to permanently end Iran’s nuclear ambitions, secure its highly enriched uranium, end its support for terror proxies in the region, obliterate its drone and ballistic missile programs, ensure the flow of goods through the Strait of Hormuz, and achieve regime change.
So far, the war has partially yielded some of those outcomes and left others unfulfilled.
Also Read: Trump says Iran deal to remain under blockade until "100% complete and fully signed"
Trump said in a phone interview on Friday that Iran had agreed to suspend its nuclear program indefinitely, in what appeared to be a new concession that Tehran has yet to verify. In negotiations that faltered before the war began and resumed again last weekend in Islamabad, US officials said Iran had declined to end its uranium enrichment.
Making things more complicated, Trump may come under immense pressure, including from some right-leaning members of his own party, not to end the conflict without clear progress on preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear bomb.
Read more: Trump Says Iran Will Suspend Nuclear Program as Hormuz Reopens
It will take a herculean effort to achieve that goal. Former President Barack Obama’s previous Iran agreement, which Trump abandoned, took more than a year and a half to negotiate. Trump was highly critical of Obama’s financial concessions in the original Iran nuclear deal, meaning that unfrozen assets, lifted sanctions, or allowing Tehran to toll ships through Hormuz could all cause blowback from national-security hawks.
On Friday, he insisted he would not release any funds to Iran. But the outlines of a new, Trump-blessed agreement could look similar to the one he threw away.
While the White House has not announced a date or location for the next round of formal talks, the Wall Street Journal reported that the US believes they are likely to take place on Monday in Pakistan. Trump told Bloomberg he had not yet settled on a delegation for those talks, but was considering dispatching some combination of Vice President JD Vance, special envoy Steve Witkoff, and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner; the president said he could personally travel to Islamabad to finalize an agreement.
“Most of the main points are finalized. It’ll go pretty quickly,” Trump said.
Trump has painted himself as a transformational leader and portrayed the attack on Iran as the culmination of a conflict that has built up for decades without action by his predecessors. But throughout the war, he’s veered from bombastic language threatening an end to Persian civilization to expressing optimism about peace. Trump told ABC News on Friday he thought a deal is in reach because he could now trust the Iranians.
“I think they’ve had enough,” he said.
On the Treadmill
Despite his optimistic, albeit vague, language on Friday, the president said a US blockade of the Strait of Hormuz would stay in place until a deal with Iran was secured.
“I think he is aware of the need to keep the pressure on till he has something in hand,” said David Hale, who served as Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs during Trump’s first term. Hale said combined military, political and economic pressure would be needed for the US to prevail.
Speaking to reporters later Friday in Arizona, the president said negotiations would continue through the weekend.
“There are parallels to what we’ve done in the past,” said Richard Nephew, a former State Department official now at Columbia University, referring to early descriptions of a potential deal. “If what this amounts to is the president is just sort of washing his hands, ‘I’ve solved the nuclear problem, now we’re done here,’ then we are still on the treadmill.”
