Trump says no need for Iran deal, Vance should focus on US

Kate Sullivan, Bloomberg News on Nov 12, 2026

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President Donald Trump said the U.S. doesn’t need a deal with Iran and instructed Vice President JD Vance to focus on domestic issues rather than negotiations with Tehran.

The directive, posted on social media on Thursday, threw cold water on ongoing back channel talks and dampened prospects for a diplomatic breakthrough to end the war. It also appeared to undercut one of Trump’s main war objectives: to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

“We don’t need a deal with Iran. Those days have long since passed. We’ve got their money, Hundreds of Billions of Dollars, and we’ve got their Strait!,” Trump posted on social media, referring to the Strait of Hormuz, a key oil shipping corridor.

Oil prices reversed losses after Trump’s comments, with Brent crude up 0.5% to around $93.25 a barrel.

The declaration comes just over a week after Trump’s Republican Party suffered a wipeout in midterm elections. Voter frustration over the war, and the surge in fuel prices it caused, was a major factor in the GOP’s heavy losses.

Vance publicly blamed the defeat on the conflict and the U.S.’s relationship with Israel, which launched the war alongside Trump in late February.

Trump said Vance should focus on what he called “Massive Corruption and Crime taking place in Democrat run Cities and States throughout the U.S.”

After meeting Monday with the prime minister of Qatar, a main mediator in talks between Washington and Tehran, Trump said he did not think further strikes were needed for now but warned the U.S. was ready to restart armed hostilities if the “status quo” was disrupted.

The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that Trump told aides he was open to Vance resuming direct discussions with Iran on ending the war, now in its ninth month, and that the vice president was weighing talks with Mohsen Rezaei, the head of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council.

Vance has long been seen as a skeptic of the president’s decision to attack Iran. He served as a lead peace negotiator earlier this year, helping secure a memorandum of understanding that led to a temporary halt in hostilities but quickly collapsed.

Trump said that agreement would have prevented Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. Without a new pact, it’s unclear how the U.S. would enforce new restrictions on Tehran’s atomic energy development.

The president more recently said that Iran’s nuclear material is buried under wreckage from military strikes and the Islamic Republican cannot make use of it. But he has also suggested the U.S. might have to strike Pickaxe Mountain, a suspected Iranian nuclear site.

Vance sent a letter to Iranian authorities in October, but Trump downplayed that outreach at the time, saying it was focused on offering medical supplies to Tehran.

The president’s comments are also likely to draw further scrutiny on his relationship with Vance, whose criticism of the war has been seen as an effort to distance himself from Trump ahead of a possible run for the White House in 2028.