Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian asked Washington on Thursday to return to the June memorandum of understanding that once framed a temporary ceasefire, and he attached a deadline the White House has already publicly refused: before Americans vote in November.
“We don’t want it to get to the midterm elections,” Pezeshkian told NBC News and other news organizations during a brief meeting on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly. “We wish Americans to return to the MoU before the midterms.”
A narrower ask than a peace deal
The document Pezeshkian named is the memorandum that laid out a framework for a temporary ceasefire. Signed in June, it collapsed after each side said the other violated its terms, and it has not been restored. His request is a return to that framework, not a final settlement.
In the same exchange he described meeting twice with the country’s new supreme leader, including a seven-hour session about a month ago — a detail that bears on whether Tehran can move quickly.
The White House answered within hours. Spokesperson Anna Kelly said the administration is focused on making sure Iran never obtains a nuclear weapon, called it “an evil country,” and pointed to Tehran’s record in the region and in the Strait of Hormuz.
Trump controls the calendar, and has said what he wants on it
Only one side sets this timetable, and it is not Tehran. In his U.N. address on Sept. 22, President Donald Trump predicted a deal would come “right after the election,” saying Iran was “waiting to see how I do in the midterm election.” He said he was weighing a deal against a far harsher option.
The politics point the same way. An NBC News Decision Desk poll found 31 percent of respondents approved of Trump’s handling of the Iran war and 69 percent disapproved, with Democrats leading into the November contests. Restoring the MoU now would pull the war off the fall campaign at the moment it is costing his party, so the administration has little interest in granting his request now.
Congress already voted, and it does not bind
If Tehran is counting on the legislature to force a reopening, the record points elsewhere. The Republican-led House adopted a war powers resolution to curb Trump’s Iran war powers 220-204, its third such vote, with a few more Republicans joining all Democrats. None reached the president’s desk, and this one would face a veto. Its sponsor, Rep. Seth Moulton, D-Mass., framed it as Congress reclaiming its constitutional role; House Foreign Affairs Chairman Brian Mast, R-Fla., said the administration is ending “forever wars.” It is messaging, not law: a concurrent resolution cannot revive the MoU or halt the strikes.
What the delay costs, and where it shows up
The Congressional Budget Office put the war’s cost above $38 billion as of Aug. 1 and running between $2 billion and $3 billion a month, and projected inflation will be 0.5 percentage points higher than expected into 2027. The effect households can see is at the pump: AAA reported a national average of $4.48 a gallon for regular gasoline on Sept. 24, the highest ever for this time of year, with the month tracking toward a record average of $4.30 against $3.83 in 2023. AAA ties the climb to volatility in the Strait of Hormuz and high crude oil prices.
A second channel, same message
Pezeshkian’s push did not happen alone. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov met Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi in New York on Thursday, and Russia’s Foreign Ministry said afterward the two agreed there is “no alternative to a diplomatic settlement,” blaming Washington and Israel for the crisis. Russia’s 2025 partnership with Tehran carries no mutual defence clause, so it reads as solidarity rather than pressure on Washington.
What Pezeshkian asked for is a calendar change he cannot make alone, and the people who can have said they will not. Trump wants the deal after the vote, Congress’s Iran votes are symbolic, and the war’s price is already visible at the pump. Absent a White House decision that a pre-election off-ramp is worth more than the politics, the MoU stays where it has been since June.