After Midterm Losses, Trump's Shifting Iran Stance Leaves Mideast Diplomacy in Limbo

On Thursday morning, President Trump posted a message telling Vice President JD Vance to give his complete and total attention to the administration's anti-fraud campaign aimed at Democrat-controlled cities and states. Vance had been his chief negotiator in earlier peace talks with Iran. The same post said the United States no longer needs a deal with Tehran. For diplomats trying to end the eight-month-old war, it landed in the middle of a week of mixed signals.

Those signals began after Republicans were badly beaten in last week's midterm elections, which cost the party control of Congress. On the day after the vote, Trump acknowledged that the war and the global economic turmoil it caused were partly to blame for the losses, while insisting the war was the right thing to do. At the start of this week he met Qatar's prime minister at the White House, then told reporters he thought it highly unlikely he would need to order new major strikes, saying the war was "militarily effectively over." By Thursday he was questioning whether he needed to rush toward an endgame. He also told conservative broadcaster Hugh Hewitt that if something does not work out, he would not hesitate to act. He said the U.S. military is "locked and loaded" and watching Pickaxe Mountain, a facility linked to Iran's nuclear program, for signs of activity.

The effect, according to two Middle East diplomats who spoke anonymously because of the sensitivity of the matter, has been limbo. Qatar, the chief mediator, is working on an interim agreement that would restore traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, the passage for oil and natural gas from the Persian Gulf, and keep the door open to further U.S.-Iran talks. Both diplomats said things looked on track after the Qatari prime minister's meeting with Trump. One now questions why Trump seems to be sidelining Vance, who was skeptical of the war but ultimately backed it. The other described the peace push as in a holding pattern, with mediators and Iranians unsure whether Trump is abandoning a negotiated deal or posturing after the midterms.

A person familiar with the matter, also anonymous, offered context. Vance had been weighing a return to talks with senior Iranian negotiators, and The Wall Street Journal reported it the day before Trump's post. Trump knew of the deliberations but believed the Iranians were not acting in good faith. He is also increasingly confident he can credibly claim to have met his military objectives. With oil shipments through the strait near prewar levels, he could leave it to Gulf countries to negotiate with Iran over governing the waterway. The strait remains dangerous, though: the United Nations reports October had the most incidents against commercial ships there since February.

The White House declined to comment directly on Trump's postelection rhetoric. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, speaking Friday evening to the Federalist Society, said the economic pain being inflicted on Iran's government is so great that military action is unnecessary. Earlier in the week he said the U.S. does not oppose mediators continuing their work. "If there's a deal to be done, the president will be the first one to be in favor of it," he said, adding that it would not be a bad deal.

Iran has not softened. It will not discuss its nuclear program until the U.S. accepts several core conditions it wants in any ceasefire, while Trump insists the nuclear differences be resolved in any deal. Iran's deputy U.N. ambassador, Gholamhossein Darzi, told the Security Council on Friday that Iran has never closed the door to diplomacy, but would respond immediately and decisively if the U.S. or Israel resumed bombing.

Democrats are critical. Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey, speaking Friday on the sidelines of his party's postelection gathering in Denver, said Trump is acting like an arsonist who set foreign policy ablaze and now wants to walk away. Allies, who were not consulted before the war began, are still dealing with its economic fallout.

Michael Singh of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, who worked on Middle East issues in George W. Bush's White House, expects the stalemate over Hormuz and the monthslong U.S. naval blockade of Iranian crude to continue. He called patience, steady pressure and letting mediators work the most sensible path, saving senior officials like Vance for the right moment. He noted Trump could reverse course on Vance if Iran appears ready to negotiate seriously.

Next week, Trump travels to the Philippines and then to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meetings in Shenzhen, China. There he is expected to hold an unprecedented three-way summit with Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin, where Iran and the three powers' nuclear stockpiles are expected to come up.