The terms of a one-page memorandum of understanding reportedly aimed at ending the war with Iran have sparked a swift backlash from President Trump’s allies, who cheer him on in his fight against the Islamic Republic.
Prominent conservative media figures and pro-Israel supporters have spoken out against the deal, which would end Iran’s nuclear enrichment activities and sustain the regime for a limited time, while U.S. sanctions would be scaled back over time.
The proposal follows Surprise announcement Trump on Tuesday announced the end of Project Freedom, a military operation that began the day before to free commercial ships stuck in the Persian Gulf.
Fox News anchor Mark Levin, who has been praised by Trump for defending the Iran war against MAGA critics, said the deal would be “catastrophic” for the Iranians and the Israeli governments.
“Domestically, as much as everyone harps on about exit ramps and deals being the best political outcome for the president and the Republicans, the opposite is true,” he wrote in X post Wednesday. “Democrats, the media and the isolationists will declare this operation a failure.”
Levin said he is inclined to believe that the terms listed in Axios are “largely false.”
However, neither Trump nor the White House refuted the report. The United States is awaiting Iran’s response to its proposal. Trump told Fox News on Wednesday that Tehran has a week to reach a peace deal.
The United States struck Iran on Thursday for the first time since a ceasefire began last month in retaliation for attacks on U.S. warships in the Strait of Hormuz, according to Central Command. Trump called it a “faucet of love” and said the ceasefire was still in effect.
The one-page agreement will set out 30 days to negotiate the details of the nuclear deal, during which the two sides will ease their blockade of the Strait of Hormuz and eventually allow free passage as before the war, according to Axios.
In exchange for Iran agreeing to halt its nuclear enrichment activities in approximately 10 to 20 years, the United States would ease sanctions and return frozen assets to the regime.
Iran hawks believe that ending the U.S. blockade would mean giving up vital influence at a time when Tehran is feeling severe economic pain.
“This would be a bad deal,” said conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt, another Trump supporter. wrote on social media Responding to Axios report.
“I would like the terms of any agreement to be stricter: Never enrich. Highly enriched uranium is a statistic for us,” he continued, referring to highly enriched uranium.
“No more proxies. Open the internet. President Trump will never give up influence. Why is he starting to get #Iran in trouble now?” Hewitt added.
Many of Israel’s staunchest supporters in the United States are unconvinced that Iran’s current leaders will abide by any deal and have urged Trump to implement the regime change he envisioned at the start of the war.
Morton Klein, director of the Zionist Organization of America, told The Hill: “If this regime continues to exist, they will do everything they can to continue to advance their agenda, fund terrorism, develop nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.”
“If they’re so eager to make a deal, as President Trump has been saying, why can’t we dictate to them what the deal has to be? I really don’t understand that.”
Trump again said on Wednesday that Tehran was pushing for a deal.
“We’re dealing with people who very much want to make a deal, and we’ll see if they can come to an agreement that satisfies us,” he said.
But behind the scenes, the White House was increasingly worried about the economic and political fallout if the war dragged on and the Strait of Hormuz remained closed.
The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday that Trump’s advisers are eager to end the conflict, start lowering gas prices and avert a jet fuel shortage that could send summer travel costs soaring.
More skeptical figures around Trump, namely Vice President Vance, have reportedly expressed concern about how the depletion of U.S. military stockpiles during war could harm its ability to defend U.S. allies and interests elsewhere around the world.
Klein said if the Trump administration’s own claims about the blockade’s success are true, Iran is just weeks away from a breakthrough.
“I think if we end up with a bad, weak deal, that’s going to be more dangerous politically for Donald Trump and the Republican Party than continuing to take action to remove this regime,” he said.
“Also, President Trump told us they’re losing $400 to $500 million a day. So the lockdown is working. There’s still a few weeks left.” [Treasury Secretary Scott] Bessant and others have said the regime will collapse. Now that the lockdown is working, and they believe it will mean the end of the regime, why don’t we continue with the lockdown? “
Bessant told Fox News over the weekend that Iran’s oil infrastructure is deteriorating rapidly under the blockade, predicting that the regime may have to start shutting down wells “in the next week.”
He said Trump had directed the Treasury Department to launch “economic rage” against Iran.
“Think about it, we’ve been running a marathon for the past 12 months and now we’re rushing to the finish line,” he told host Maria Bartiromo. “We are suffocating the regime and they cannot afford to pay their soldiers.”
While Bessant and Trump believe natural gas prices will fall quickly once the war ends, divisions within Trump’s base over Iran run deeper than the economic fallout.
Longtime Trump supporters Tucker Carlson and Megyn Kelly, among others, have accused the president of breaking promises to engage the United States in regime-change wars and risking American lives in foreign conflicts.
Carlson and Kelly have frequently butted heads with Levine and Iran hawks in Congress, such as Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who believe the war is worth the risk. Senators have remained conspicuously silent since the terms of the latest deal were announced.
Mark Dubowitz, chief executive of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a hawkish think tank in Washington, warned Trump not to lift sanctions, end the blockade or take military action before making maximum concessions on his nuclear program.
“The correct response is not to give them what they want for free, but to keep the vise tight,” he said on his podcast “The Collapse of Iran.”
Dubowitz worries that Trump could be “convinced that a ceasefire is good enough and then end up with an unreachable deal, which would be a waste.”
“The president’s authority has lasted two and a half years; the regime has run out of money, leadership, and time; the regime can no longer count on the population,” he added. “This is not a position of weakness, but the strongest approach that any previous U.S. administration has taken against the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
Dubowitz and the Journal’s editorial board both warned that the outlines of the agreement reported by Axios were similar to the Iran nuclear deal negotiated under former President Obama but from which Trump withdrew during his first term.
“Mr. Trump must stand his ground because he knows Iran does not need domestic enrichment beyond bombs, and he cannot expect regime behavior to change over time, which was a mistake Mr. Obama made,” The magazine editorial board writes.
“Nor can he trust a future president to reimpose severe restrictions later. Mr. Trump is unique in his willingness to confront Iran. The task of any deal is to ensure total nuclear dismantling while Mr. Trump remains in office. If Iran does not do so, the president will have to make good on his threats” to resume military operations, the report concluded.
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