In a sermon Friday, a regime official purported that President Donald Trump lost the election because of his maximum pressure strategy that he applied against Iran.
“Poor Trump tried so hard that his back broke. Why did Trump’s administration lose the elections, or at least so it seems? Because it applied maximum pressure on the Iranian people,” said Nassir Hosseini, a representative for Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in a video posted by the Middle East Media Research Institute.
Hosseini’s sermon in Yasuj, Iran was broadcasted on Iran television and criticized the past and current American administrations for acting with hostility towards Iran.
“So far, no American administration has decreased America’s hostility and treachery (towards Iran). We hope that their administrations come to their senses,” said Hosseini.
Hosseini emphasized that the results of the 2020 election should act as a warning to the next administration, threatening “if [the next administration] wants to use force and to act like a bully it will face the same fate as Trump.”
President Trump’s maximum pressure strategy diverges from the Obama administration’s appeasement approach. The strategy was designed to weaken the Iranian regime’s influence in the region and reverse policies of tolerance towards Iran’s “destructive and destabilizing behavior in the Middle East and beyond.”
Trump’s strategy is informed by the belief that “peace and stability cannot prevail in the Middle East as long as Iran continues to foment violence, unrest hatred, and war,” according to remarks by the President following the U.S. targeted killing of Qassem Soleimani in January.
“The civilized world must send a clear and unified message to the Iranian regime: Your campaign of terror, murder, mayhem will not be tolerated any longer. It will not be allowed to go forward.”
Iran was designated a state sponsor of terror by the U.S. State Department in 1984, providing direct support to Hamas, Hezbollah, and terrorist groups throughout Syria, Iraq, and the Middle East.
