President Trump said on Thursday that he had pulled Vice President JD Vance back from engaging in potential peace talks with Iran, saying that his time would be better spent investigating fraud in Democratic-run jurisdictions.
“We don’t need a deal with Iran,” Mr. Trump wrote on social media. “Those days have long since passed.”
The post deepens questions about what Mr. Trump’s plan is to end the war. The president has been weighing a number of options, including ramping up military strikes, withdrawing and leaving the matter to Arab allies or simply maintaining the status quo.
It also signals a pivot on his instructions to Mr. Vance, after the vice president publicly blamed the war for the Republican Party’s devastating midterm election losses.
Mr. Trump had assigned Mr. Vance, who privately expressed opposition to going to war with Iran, to lead negotiations earlier this year. The vice president traveled to Pakistan in April and met with Iranian leaders in a marathon session that ended without any resolution.
Mr. Vance recently contacted a top Iranian political and military official to propose a renewal of comprehensive peace negotiations. In a letter sent from Mr. Vance via Qatari meditators to Gen. Mohsen Rezaei, the secretary of the Supreme National Security Council and former commander in chief of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, the vice president suggested that American and Iranian officials meet soon, adding that he would lead the talks for the United States.
But Mr. Trump said on Thursday that he was ending that effort.
“I have asked Vice President Vance to focus his complete and total attention on the Massive Corruption and Crime taking place in Democrat run Cities and States throughout the U.S.,” he wrote on social media.
While there is a high-profile fraud investigation in Minnesota that has resulted in scores of arrests, federal data does not support the president’s suggestion that fraud occurs more prevalently under Democrats than Republicans. Mr. Trump has also granted clemency to more than 70 allies, donors and others convicted in fraud cases, often involved high-dollar totals.
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