(A)Political - May 30th

Good morning everyone,

It’s been a busy week in D.C. Let’s jump in!

Trump stated in his latest Truth Social post that a deal is being decided on for the Iran war. Former AG Pam Bondi faced congressional heat during her testimony regarding the Epstein files release. Treasury Secretary Bessent stated to the press that the U.S. seized roughly $1 billion worth of crypto from Iran.

• ‘Final Determination’ Being Made For Iran Deal

• Former AG Bondi Draws Heat From Dem’s During Epstein Files Testimony

• Bessent Claims $1 Billion In Crypto Seized From Iran

‘Final Determination’ Being Made For Iran Deal

_{By: Atlas}

President Donald Trump met with senior national security officials in the White House Situation Room on Friday to make what he had described in advance as a "final determination" on the framework deal with Iran. After roughly two hours of deliberations, the meeting ended without a decision, a senior administration official said.

The session followed a Thursday announcement by U.S. and Iranian negotiators that they had reached a tentative memorandum of understanding, pending approval by Trump and Iran's leadership, that would extend the existing ceasefire by 60 days and open formal talks on the future of Iran's nuclear program. Vice President JD Vance, speaking Thursday, said the two sides were "going back and forth on a couple of language points," including "the question of enrichment," and described the gap as narrow but not yet closed.

A White House official, speaking after the Situation Room meeting, said Trump "will only make a deal that is good for America and satisfies his red lines" and reiterated that "Iran can never possess a nuclear weapon." The official offered no further details and did not address the question of when a final decision would be made.

The Five Conditions

In a Truth Social post earlier in the day, Trump laid out the conditions he said any deal would need to satisfy. Iran would have to agree to never develop a nuclear weapon. The Strait of Hormuz would be reopened in both directions "for unrestricted shipping traffic," with no tolls. Any mines remaining in the waterway would have to be removed or destroyed. The U.S. naval blockade of Iranian ports — which has redirected 115 ships since it began in mid-April, according to a Friday update from U.S. Central Command — would be lifted in parallel.

The fifth and most contentious condition concerned Iran's stockpile of highly enriched uranium. Trump said the material — which he has previously described as "nuclear dust" — "will be unearthed by the United States" in coordination with the Iranian government and the International Atomic Energy Agency, then destroyed. The proposed memorandum, according to a U.S. official briefed on its contents, would require Iran to remove all mines from the strait within 30 days and would gradually lift the blockade in parallel with the reopening of the waterway.

Trump also signaled that the financial side of the proposed package would not move quickly. "No money will be exchanged, until further notice," he wrote. "Other items, of far less importance, have been agreed to. I will be meeting now, in the Situation Room, to make a final determination."

The International Atomic Energy Agency assesses that Iran holds 440.9 kilograms — about 972 pounds — of uranium enriched to 60 percent purity, a short technical step from weapons-grade. The stockpile is believed to be buried under three nuclear sites that were badly damaged in the opening U.S. and Israeli strikes on February 28.

Iranian Pushback

Tehran's public response sat in clear tension with Trump's framing. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei told state media that the agreement "has not been finalized yet" and said Iranian officials were "focused on the end of war and are not discussing the details of the nuclear plan at this point." Baghaei separately rejected the prescriptive tone of Trump's post, saying the Islamic Republic "said goodbye to the language of 'must' 47 years ago."

The country's chief negotiator, Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, posted on X that Iran has "no trust in guarantees or words" and only judges by actions. "No step will be taken before the other side acts," Qalibaf wrote. "We do not gain concessions through talks, but through missiles; in negotiations, we merely make them understand this. The winner of any agreement is the one who, from the day after it, is better prepared for war."

Iran's Fars news agency, which is close to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, was more pointed. It described Trump's account of the framework as a "mixture of truth and lies," citing informed sources who said no provision to destroy Iran's nuclear material appeared in the text and that the toll-free reopening of the strait was not in the agreement either. Tasnim, another Iranian outlet, reported that the memorandum text "is not finalized yet" and that Western media accounts of an imminent deal were "not precise."

The Money Question

A central piece of the gap appears to be financial. Iranian sources cited by Fars said Tehran is demanding "the immediate release of $12 billion in frozen Iranian assets" before it moves to the next phase of negotiations. Ebrahim Azizi, who chairs the Iranian parliament's national security commission, posted publicly that Iran "sets the terms: cash for cash, credit for credit, nothing for nothing."

Trump's post made clear that no funds would be released at the outset of any agreement. Under the proposed framework, the United States would relax sanctions in stages, allowing Iran to sell more of its oil during the 60-day window, with broader sanctions relief and the release of frozen funds to be negotiated separately.

The two sides also continue to disagree on who would manage the Strait of Hormuz once it reopens. Baghaei said Iran and Oman, which lie on opposite sides of the waterway, would handle transit "based on their own national interests and the interests of the international community." Trump on Wednesday warned Oman not to enter into a shared-management agreement with Iran or the U.S. would "have to blow them up." Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said he had spoken with his Omani counterpart Friday and had expressed solidarity "in the face of any threat."

The War Backdrop

The diplomacy is taking place against renewed exchanges of fire between the two sides. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said Thursday it had targeted a U.S. air base in Kuwait that it described as "the source" of recent U.S. strikes on the southern Iranian port city of Bandar Abbas. U.S. Central Command called the attack an "egregious ceasefire violation." Iran's state television said 24 vessels had transited the strait in the past 24 hours but warned that "ships from hostile countries face a severe response."

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, speaking at a security summit in Singapore, said the United States retained the option to resume strikes against Iran if the talks collapsed. "Our stockpiles are more than suited for that, both there and around the globe, because of how we balance exquisite and more plentiful munitions," Hegseth said. "So we're in a very good place." For its part, the IRGC has warned that any return to full-scale war would spread "far beyond the region" and produce "crushing blows" against U.S. forces, Israel, and Gulf states.

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