Foreign Policy

Trump Tells Officials to Do Whatever They Want to Iran

Written by SK Ashby

The Trump regime has already done a great deal of damage to our credibility and standing in the world, but that doesn't mean they can't do a little bit more on their way out of Washingston.

In an apparent attempt to bury one of President Obama's biggest achievements even further than he already has, Trump has reportedly told his cabinet they can do anything just short of starting a war with Iran during the last two months they still hold power.

The goal is to make it as difficult as possible for the Biden administration to resurrect the Iran nuclear peace deal.

That has left a host of options at the outgoing administration’s disposal—among them, a suffocating sanctions regime and a studied silence in the face of the assassination of Iranian nationals. Two officials who spoke to The Daily Beast said the administration is set to announce new sanctions on regime-linked companies and individuals in the coming weeks to solidify a years-long effort to paralyze Tehran’s economy.

Knowledgeable sources say those actions are designed to help fulfill various Trump officials’ long-brewing desire to make it more difficult for the Democratic president-elect to rekindle negotiations with Tehran and re-enter a nuclear deal. And it’s a scenario for which Biden lieutenants and allies have long prepared, having already factored into their Iran strategy that current U.S. officials would do nearly everything they could to undermine a revival of Obama-era relations between the adversarial nations.

This isn't necessarily because Trump has any particular feelings about Joe Biden or even Iran and Schrodinger's nuclear program, mind you, this is still about President Obama.

It's remarkable how so much of the world can change in such a short amount of time just because one single man, Donald Trump, made it his mission undo every achievement of the nation's first black president.

Trump didn't act entirely alone, of course, as the entire Republican party was animated by their hatred of President Obama. That is why they nominated, elected, and supported the world's premier Birther. It was and still largely is their single, unifying principle: owning the libs in revenge for making them live under a black president. Trump has pushed the boundaries even for Republicans at times, but he still did as much as he could to erase President Obama's legacy and that's all that ultimately mattered.

The world has endured many of the horrors of the last four years, in part, because of American racism.