All through Iran’s presidential marketing campaign, in debates, rallies and speeches, a singular presence has hovered: Donald J. Trump.
To listen to the six candidates inform it, the previous president’s victory within the 2024 White Home race is a foregone conclusion. The pressing query going through Iranian voters as they go to the polls on Friday, they are saying, is who’s greatest suited to cope with him.
They rarely point out President Biden, and so they by no means convey up the numerous polls suggesting that the American election will likely be extraordinarily shut. As a substitute, Mr. Trump’s title is invoked repeatedly.
“Wait and you will notice what is going to occur when Trump comes,” one candidate, the cleric Mostafa Pourmohammadi, stated throughout a latest televised debate. “We’ve to prepare for negotiations.” One other candidate, Alireza Zakani, Tehran’s mayor, accused his rivals at a debate of getting “Trump-phobia,” insisting that solely he might handle him.
In one among Mr. Pourmohammadi’s marketing campaign posters, he and Mr. Trump are eye to eye, staring one another down. “The one who can stand in entrance of Trump is me,” it reads.
Iranians have ample purpose to be cautious of one other Trump presidency. It was Mr. Trump who unilaterally pulled the USA out of Iran’s cope with world powers over its nuclear program, regardless that U.N. nuclear inspectors had repeatedly confirmed that Iran was complying with its commitments. Mr. Biden has made efforts to revive the deal since taking workplace, to no avail.
Mr. Trump additionally imposed powerful financial sanctions focusing on Iran’s oil revenues and worldwide banking transactions, and people sanctions have remained below Mr. Biden. These measures, in addition to corruption and financial mismanagement by the management, have tanked Iran’s economic system, sending the forex plunging and spiking inflation.
Analysts say the shadow thrown by Mr. Trump exhibits how central international coverage is to the election, with all six candidates — 5 conservatives and a reformist — acknowledging that any hope for financial aid is inseparable from Tehran’s relations with the world.
“The potential return of the Trump administration has turn out to be a bogey in presidential debates,” stated Vali Nasr, a former Obama administration official and a professor on the Johns Hopkins College College of Superior Worldwide Research in Washington.
“Exhausting-liners argue their toughness will tame Trump, and reasonable and reformist candidates consider that Trump will react to hard-liners with much more strain on Iran, hinting that they’re higher positioned to vary the dialog with the U.S.,” he stated.
In Iran’s political circles, concern a couple of Trump comeback predates this particular presidential election, which is being held to exchange President Ebrahim Raisi, who died in a helicopter crash in Could. The Overseas Ministry created an off-the-cuff working group within the spring to start making ready for Mr. Trump’s return, two Iranian officers stated.
Iran negotiated not directly a number of occasions this yr and final with the USA via Oman and Qatar for a prisoner swap and to defuse regional tensions, and it engaged in oblique negotiations for a return to the nuclear cope with each the Trump and Biden administrations.
The officers, who requested to not be named as a result of they weren’t licensed to talk publicly, stated that, ought to Mr. Trump be elected, Iran would proceed oblique negotiations however wouldn’t meet with him instantly. They stated that they mentioned whether or not ready to cope with Mr. Trump would make extra sense than reaching an settlement with Mr. Biden now, solely to have a Republican, whether or not Mr. Trump or another Republican president sooner or later, tear it up.
Mohammad Baqer Ghalibaf, the conservative speaker of the Iranian Parliament, who is taken into account the front-runner within the presidential race, put it this fashion: “When we face an enemy like Trump who doesn’t behave with integrity, we now have to be calculative in our conduct.” Mr. Ghalibaf, a former commander within the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, has stated that restoring the nuclear deal and sanctions aid are amongst his high priorities. He stated if the president doesn’t make well timed choices he would “both should promote Iran to Trump or create tensions within the nation.”
Mr. Trump repeatedly stated throughout his presidency that his coverage of most strain on Iran was geared toward cornering the nation into making concessions on its nuclear program, and that he was not on the lookout for regime change. He defended his coverage final week in a virtual interview with the All In podcast.
“I’d have made a good cope with Iran; I used to be going to get together with Iran,” Mr. Trump stated within the interview. He stated his essential aim was to disclaim Iran nuclear weapons. “I had them at some extent the place you can’ve negotiated,” he added, in a declare disputed by analysts. “A baby might’ve made a cope with them.”
In Iran’s theocratic system, the supreme chief, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has the ultimate say on all main state issues, together with negotiations with the USA and nuclear coverage. However the Iranian president does set the home agenda and has some affect on international coverage.
There may be concern amongst Iranian voters about Mr. Trump, stated a marketing campaign workers member for the reformist candidate, Dr. Masoud Pezeshkian, who requested to not be named as a result of he was not licensed to talk publicly. The workers member stated by phone from Tehran that voters had contacted the Pezeshkian marketing campaign via social media asking what the candidate’s plans have been for countering Mr. Trump.
Dr. Pezeshkian has made the former foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, the chief nuclear negotiator who helped seal the 2015 deal, the face of his international coverage. However Dr. Pezeshkian’s advisers stated that his selection for international minister could be Abbas Araghchi, who was Mr. Zarif’s deputy and a member of the group that negotiated the nuclear pact in 2015.
Throughout a televised round-table dialogue, Mr. Zarif instructed one among Dr. Pezeshkian’s conservative rivals that Iran had been capable of elevate its oil gross sales to pre-sanctions ranges of two million barrels a day as a result of Mr. Biden had “loosened the screws,” including: “Watch for Trump to come back again, and we’ll see what you’ll do.”
At a rally in Tehran on Monday, Saeed Jalili, an ultraconservative candidate who was additionally concerned within the nuclear talks, addressed Mr. Trump with a well known quote from Qassim Suleimani, the high-ranking common whose 2020 assassination was ordered by Mr. Trump.
“Mr. Trump, you gambler, we’re those who can cope with you,” Mr. Jalili stated, rousing the gang to wild cheers and claps.
Leily Nikounazar contributed reporting.