Biden administration casts a chill on prospects for resuming Iran nuclear talks

After Iran’s supreme leader signaled his willingness to resume nuclear negotiations with the United States, the Biden administration has cast doubt on the likelihood of a resumption of talks in the near future.

“We will judge Iran’s leaders by their actions, not their words,” a State Department spokesperson said Tuesday.

“If Iran wants to demonstrate its seriousness or a new approach, it should stop nuclear escalation and start meaningfully cooperating with the IAEA,” they added, referring to the International Atomic Energy Agency, an intergovernmental watchdog that Tehran has often subverted.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Tuesday gave the green light to Iran’s new president, reformist Masoud Pezeshkian, to restart negotiations with the United States, while warning the country’s government not to trust Washington.

“This does not mean that we cannot interact with the same enemy in certain situations,” Khamenei said, according to the official transcript of his remarks. “There is nothing wrong with that, but do not place your hopes in them.”

The State Department spokesman said the administration still believes a negotiated solution is the best way to contain Iran’s nuclear program, but that Iran’s failure to cooperate with the IAEA and its escalatory actions make diplomacy impossible.

“We are far from anything like that at the moment,” they said.

Administration officials also largely view the prospect of returning to indirect negotiations with Iran as a politically unfavorable step that could prove detrimental to Vice President Kamala Harris and other Democrats’ chances of winning in November, multiple officials told ABC News.

The uncertain prospects for restarting negotiations in the coming months further diminish the already slim chances of reaching an Iran deal before President Joe Biden’s term in office ends, making his promise to negotiate a “longer, stronger” agreement almost out of reach.

Khamenei’s comments Tuesday echo the position he took when Tehran signed the 2015 nuclear pact known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA — a landmark agreement that granted Iran relief from economic sanctions in exchange for curbing its nuclear program.

Former President Donald Trump withdrew the United States from the deal in 2018, calling it a “horrible one-sided deal that should never have been made,” and reimposed financial restrictions on Iran.

In the years since, Khamenei’s public comments on the issue have oscillated between encouraging negotiations with the United States and outright dismissing the possibility of renewing the pact.

Foreign policy observers say the upcoming US presidential election adds further uncertainty to the prospects for reaching a new nuclear deal with Iran.

Trump has previously claimed, without foundation, that Iran was willing to accept very favorable terms with the United States at the end of his term and that he was “ready to make a deal.” But during his election campaign, Trump, a sworn enemy of the Iranian regime, adopted an increasingly aggressive stance toward the country, which allegedly carried out a cyberattack targeting his campaign and plotted against him and his former Cabinet members.

Harris has also vowed to take an aggressive approach to reducing Iran’s malign influence in the Middle East, but she has supported the JCPOA, as well as the current administration’s efforts to reach a new deal. However, she has not made clear whether she will try to pick up where Biden left off.

Indirect talks with Iran under the Biden administration officially began in April 2021. Despite initial optimism from mediators, the talks ultimately collapsed after several rounds of hit-and-miss diplomacy failed to move the two sides toward a deal.

So far, Biden has kept another of his major promises regarding Iran: his declaration that the country would “never acquire a nuclear weapon under my watch.”

However, officials in his administration say Tehran has made substantial progress toward that goal in recent years.

In July, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that Iran was likely only “a week or two” away from having the capability to produce fissile material for a nuclear weapon, and that the United States was watching “very, very carefully” to see whether the country would move toward weaponizing its nuclear program, a step the administration has not yet taken.

The US decision to rule out any possibility of new negotiations with Iran comes amid heightened tensions in the Middle East, particularly after Israel’s preemptive strike Saturday night against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon.