US President Donald Trump on Monday criticized the Islamic Republic’s violent crackdown on protests but stopped short of calling for regime change, hours after demonstrators demanded a new ruling system in nationwide protests.
Speaking on Monday in Florida alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump said Iranian authorities routinely open fire on demonstrators.
“They kill people,” Trump said at Mar-a-Lago. “Every time they have a riot, or somebody forms a group, little or big, they start shooting people.”
Massive nationwide protests erupted across Iran over the weekend, with merchants vowing to continue their shutdowns into a third day on Tuesday.
What began as anger over the soaring price of the US dollar and the collapse of the rial has widened into a broader wave of unrest, spreading beyond market corridors into streets, squares and university campuses across several provinces.
While the slogans were mainly focused on economic issues on the first day, the second day's chants underscored a transition from economic frustration to more explicit political dissent.
Chants in several cities targeted Iran's political authority, with crowds shouting slogans such as 'death to the dictator" and "Seyyed Ali (Khamenei) will be toppled this year".
When asked about regime change in Iran on Monday, the US president drew a line.
“I’m not going to talk about overthrow of a regime,” Trump said, adding that Iran’s leadership already faces severe internal pressure.
“They’ve got a lot of problems. They have tremendous inflation. Their economy is bust. And I know that people aren’t so happy.”
He told reporters Monday that Iranians are increasingly discontented with their rulers. “There’s tremendous discontent. They form 100,000, 200,000 people. All of a sudden, people start getting shot, and that group disbands pretty quickly,” he said.
Long history of brutal crackdowns
Speaking to reporters alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Florida, Trump said the United States will deal a heavy blow on Iran if it tries to recover from the US and Israeli strikes in June.
"I'm hearing that Iran is trying to recover—if that happens, we'll have to hit them hard," Trump added.
"If they will continue with the missiles, yes. The nuclear, fast. Okay? One will be yes, absolutely. The other was, we'll do it immediately," Trump said when asked if he would support Israel's strikes on Iran in case it further develops its ballistic missile and nuclear programs.
In a joint press conference with Netanyahu later in the day, Trump said he hopes Iran is "not trying to build up again, because if they are, we're going to have no choice, but very quickly to eradicate that buildup."
"I hope Iran is not trying to build up, as I've been reading, that they're building up weapons and other things. And if they are, they're not using the sites that we obliterated, but they're using possibly different sites. We know exactly where they're going, what they're doing, and I hope they're not doing it, because we don't want to waste the fuel on B-2, it's a 37-hour trip both ways. I don't want to waste a lot of fuel," he said.
The United States held five rounds of negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program earlier this year, for which Trump set a 60-day deadline.
When no agreement was reached by the 61st day on June 13, Israel launched a surprise military offensive followed by US strikes on June 22 targeting key nuclear facilities in Isfahan, Natanz and Fordow.
The attacks killed nuclear scientists along with hundreds of military personnel and civilians. Iranian counterattacks killed 32 Israeli civilians and an off-duty soldier.
Iran denies seeking nuclear weapons and says its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has said dealing with Trump is beneath the dignity of the Islamic Republic, while Iranian officials have rejected US demands to end uranium enrichment and curb missile capabilities.
Meanwhile, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi spoke with Oman’s Foreign Minister on Monday over the phone. Oman has previously mediated negotiations between Tehran and Washington.
Trump blames Obama for nuclear Iran
Ahead of his meeting with Netanyahu, Trump shared a post on his Truth Social account of an old share on X that the Obama and Biden administrations gave money to Iran to fund its nuclear program.
The message originated on X from an account using the pen name Chris Bjornberg and was part of a promotion for his 2023 book “The Night Rider and the Warrior Queen.”
“One of Obama’s most treasonous policies was to fund Iran’s nuclear program,” the post shared by Trump said, alongside an image of a nuclear explosion over New York City and further criticism of Democratic administrations’ Iran policy.
“Biden and Obama gave Iran over $220 billion to research and build nukes. Iran nearly had 6 nuclear bombs and Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBM’s) that would have destroyed Israel and 5 cities in the US," the post said.
The Obama administration negotiated the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which restricted Tehran’s nuclear activities in return for sanctions relief, before Trump withdrew the United States from the agreement in 2018.
Iran has since expanded its nuclear program beyond JCPOA limits, and the deal has effectively stalled.
Violence against protesters is not new in the Islamic Republic.
Amnesty International has documented past crackdowns in which security forces fired live ammunition at largely peaceful crowds.
During the 2022 Woman Life Freedom movement, sparked by the in-custody death of Mahsa Jina Amini, security forces fired on and killed protesters in cities across Iran, with many victims reportedly targeted in the eyes, according to human rights groups and the UN Fact-Finding Mission on Iran.
The November 2019 demonstrations, known as “Bloody November,” are also widely considered one of the deadliest crackdowns in recent decades, with security forces shooting directly at protesters and killing hundreds.
