The Memo: Vance tries to sell Iran deal as skeptics get loud

Administration The Memo: Vance tries to sell Iran deal as skeptics get loud Comments: by Niall Stanage - 06/18/26 6:49 PM ET Comments: Link copied by Niall Stanage - 06/18/26 6:49 PM ET Comments: Link copied

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Vice President Vance was once again thrust to the fore in trying to calm GOP unease over the interim deal between Iran and the U.S. on Thursday. It’s no easy task.

Several Republican lawmakers and a larger number of prominent conservative commentators are criticizing the deal. Their complaints vary in the specifics, but the common theme is that the memorandum of understanding (MOU) is too soft on Iran and does too little to protect American — and Israeli — interests.

Vance went before the media in the White House briefing room to make the case for the defense. His core argument was that the most ostensibly generous elements of the MOU hinge upon Iranian compliance and will never become relevant unless Tehran plays ball.

“The idea that they get benefits before they change their behavior is fundamentally a talking point that is issued by people who want the conflict to continue indefinitely,” Vance said at one point.

His reference to such people hinted at the GOP division between an “America First” faction that leans toward isolationism generally and a more hawkish or neoconservative group that is aghast at the deal.

Vance, who served in a noncombat role in Iraq as a Marine two decades ago, is identified very much with the “America First” school of thought. He is widely reported to have been among the most skeptical members of Trump’s inner circle with respect to the desirability of attacking Iran in the first place.

But despite efforts from him and Trump — who held his own news conference the previous day as he prepared to leave a Group of Seven summit in France — criticism keeps growing.

Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) on Thursday issued a scathing assessment of the deal.

Wicker, the chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, complained that the MOU “negotiates away the victories” accomplished by the U.S. military in Iran.

Wicker further asserted that a proposed $300 billion fund for the reconstruction of Iran — which he acknowledged would not be bankrolled by American taxpayers — “would make Iran’s payoff under President Obama’s 2015 deal look like a pittance in comparison.”

The Mississippi senator also took issue with proposals that could ultimately lift sanctions against Iran or see currently frozen Iranian assets be released. And he condemned the fact that the peace deal encompasses the conflict in Lebanon — something that he characterized as a decision “to force Israel to stand down against Hezbollah.”

The deepening rift between the U.S. and Israel — and specifically between Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — is one of the most compelling elements in the current drama.

Trump has, in recent days, criticized Netanyahu and the government he leads for actions that the U.S. president plainly sees as both disproportionate and unhelpful. During Trump’s Wednesday news conference, he said that Netanyahu was prone to getting too “excited.”

Using Netanyahu’s nickname, Trump said of Israel’s attacks on Lebanon: “I say, ‘You can do a little softer touch, Bibi. You don’t have to knock down a building every time somebody walks into it that’s from Hezbollah.’”

Tellingly, Vance amplified those criticisms rather than trying to tamp them down in the briefing room. “This does bother me,” he said, to see members of Netanyahu’s cabinet criticize the deal or Trump himself.

“Donald J. Trump is the only head of state in the entire world who is sympathetic to the nation of Israel at this moment in time,” Vance added. “If I was in the cabinet of the Israeli government, I might not be attacking the only powerful ally that I have anywhere left in the entire world.”

In a separate podcast interview with Ross Douthat of the New York Times, Vance singled out two ultra-right members of Netanyahu’s government, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.

“My response to them would be: What is your exact proposal?” Vance said. “You’re a country of 9 million people. You can’t just kill your way out of solving every single national security problem that you have.”

The starkness of the message — and the fact that it is particularly unusual to hear a Republican administration use such a tone — won Vance some praise from unusual quarters on the left, just as Trump’s criticisms of Netanyahu had done the previous day.

But it also sparked consternation from those who believe the U.S. should be constantly at Israel’s side.

Closer to home, the question is what the political and electoral ramifications of the Iran deal will be. The midterm elections are less than five months away.

On one hand, the deal has laid bare these conservative divisions. It has also sharpened questions about why Trump, in conjunction with Netanyahu, launched the war in the first place.

On the other hand, the war was unpopular, in part because of the spike in gas prices and broader inflationary pressure that it caused. Presumably, it is electorally prudent for Trump to get out of it sooner rather than later.

When Trump alluded briefly to the conflict during a Medal of Honor ceremony at the White House on Thursday afternoon, he emphasized stock market gains and a decline in the price of oil.

Although this came with the usual hyperbole, the Nasdaq and the S&P 500 did rise sharply on Thursday. Financial markets are plainly relieved that the Strait of Hormuz is reopening.

Vance, at the White House, immediately asserted that 12.5 million barrels of oil had transited the Strait “last night” — something which he said was “a high since the beginning of the conflict.”

Later, having previously pushed back with some semblance of humor at the idea that he was being made the “fall guy” for the Iran deal, Vance was also asked what he would say to GOP critics of the deal on Capitol Hill.

Aside from urging “faith” in Trump, he insisted: “We’ve got to tell the story about what this means for Americans, how it’s going to make us all safer and more prosperous.”

Much hinges on how many people believe that story.

The Memo is a reported column by Niall Stanage.

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