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Ex-Envoy Reportedly Leading Trump’s State Dept. Transition Indicates Return of ‘Maximum Pressure’ Against Iran
Then-US State Department Special Representative for Iran, Brian Hook, at the White House in Washington, DC, US, Aug. 13, 2020. Photo: Oliver Contreras/SIPA USA via Reuters Connect
The man reportedly leading the transition team for the incoming Trump administration’s State Department has indicated that US policy will return to a campaign of maximum pressure against Iran when President-elect Donald Trump returns to the White House in January.
During an interview with CNN on Thursday, Brian Hook, who served as Trump’s special envoy for Iran during the president-elect’s first term in office, argued that the US should establish a firm and aggressive posture toward the Iranian regime. Hook claimed that efforts to accommodate Iran, through actions such as easing sanctions, only accelerate instability in the Middle East.
“President Trump understands that the chief driver of instability in today’s Middle East is the Iranian regime, and the Gulf is, I think, the most economically dynamic and culturally vibrant region in the world today,” Hook said, referring to the Arab countries on the Persian Gulf. “And this sort of extremism and revolutionary ideology that the Iranian regime exports is one of the obstacles, right, to continuing on this good path.”
Hook, who according to CNN is expected to lead Trump’s transition team at the State Department, suggested that American weakness ward Iran emboldens other nations to strengthen their ties to the regime.
“And when the United States decides to seek accommodations with Iran, it then creates the space for other countries to do the same,” Hook said.
For years, US intelligence agencies have called Iran the world’s foremost state sponsor of terrorism.
Hook added that countries “on the front lines of Iranian aggression” are among the most interest in deterring the threats that the regime poses. However, he emphasized that Trump”“has no interest” in toppling and replacing Iranian leadership.
“The future of Iran will be decided by the Iranian people,” Hook asserted.
The former State Department official reiterated that Trump plans to “isolate Iran diplomatically and weaken them economically” in an effort to neuter the regime’s capability to “destabilize Israel” and the broader region through the funding of terrorist groups such as Hamas, Hezbollah, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
When Trump was president, his administration pursued what became known as a policy of exerting “maximum pressure” on the regime, primarily through sanctions.
Harsh US sanctions levied on Iran under the Trump administration crippled the Iranian economy and led its foreign exchange reserves to plummet. Trump and his Republican supporters in the US Congress have criticized the Biden administration for renewing billions of dollars in US sanctions waivers, which had the effect of unlocking frozen funds and allowing the country to access previously inaccessible hard currency. Critics argue that Iran likely used these funds to provide resources for Hamas and Hezbollah to wage new terrorist campaigns against the Jewish state, including the brutal Oct. 7 massacres throughout southern Israel perpetrated by Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists.
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Trump Administration to Release Over $5 Billion School Funding That It Withheld
US Secretary of Education Linda McMahon and President Donald Trump, in the East Room at the White House in Washington, DC, US, March 20, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Carlos Barria
President Donald Trump’s administration will release more than $5 billion in previously approved funding for K-12 school programs that it froze over three weeks ago under a review, which had led to bipartisan condemnation.
“(The White House Office of Management and Budget) has completed its review … and has directed the Department to release all formula funds,” Madi Biedermann, deputy assistant secretary for communications at the U.S. Education Department, said in a statement, adding funds will be dispersed to states next week.
Further details on the review and what it found were not shared.
A senior administration official said “guardrails” would be in place for the amount being released, without giving details.
Early in July, the Trump administration said it would not release funding previously appropriated by Congress for schools and that an initial review found signs the money was misused to subsidize what it alleged was “a radical leftwing agenda.”
States say $6.8 billion in total was affected by the freeze. Last week, $1.3 billion was released.
After the freeze, a coalition of mostly Democratic-led states sued to challenge the move, and 10 Republican US senators wrote to the Republican Trump administration to reverse its decision.
The frozen money covered funding for education of migrant farm workers and their children; recruitment and training of teachers; English proficiency learning; academic enrichment and after-school and summer programs.
The Trump administration has threatened schools and colleges with withholding federal funds over issues like climate initiatives, transgender policies, pro-Palestinian protests against U.S. ally Israel’s war in Gaza and diversity, equity and inclusion practices.
Republican US lawmakers welcomed the move on Friday, while Democratic lawmakers said there was no need to disrupt funding in the first place.
Education Secretary Linda McMahon separately said she was satisfied with what was found in the review and released the money, adding she did not think there would be future freezes.
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Israel to Resume Airdrop Aid to Gaza on Saturday, Military Says
Palestinians carry aid supplies which they received from the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in the central Gaza Strip, May 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ramadan Abed/File Photo
Israel will resume airdrop aid to Gaza on Saturday night, the Israeli military said, a few days after more than 100 aid agencies warned that mass starvation was spreading across the enclave.
“The airdrops will include seven pallets of aid containing flour, sugar, and canned food to be provided by international organizations,” the military added in a statement.
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Trump Says Hamas ‘Didn’t Want to Make a Deal,’ Now Likely to Get ‘Hunted Down’
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., July 8, 2025. Photo: Kevin Lamarque via Reuters Connect.
i24 News – US President Donald Trump on Friday said the Palestinian jihadists of Hamas did not want to make a deal on a ceasefire and hostage release in Gaza.
“Now we’re down to the final hostages, and they know what happens after you get the final hostages. And basically because of that, they really didn’t want to make a deal,” Trump said.
The comments followed statements by Middle East peace envoy Steve Witkoff and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the effect that Israel was now considering “alternative” options to achieve its goals of bringing its hostages home from Gaza and ending the terror rule of Hamas in the coastal enclave.
Trump added he believed Hamas leaders would now be “hunted down.”
On Thursday, Witkoff said the Trump administration had decided to bring its negotiating team home for consultations following Hamas’s latest proposal. Witkoff said overnight that Hamas was to blame for the impasse, with Netanyahu concurring.
Trump also dismissed the significance of French President Emmanuel Macron’s announcement that Paris would become the first major Western power to recognize an independent Palestinian state.
Macron’s comments, “didn’t carry any weight,” the US leader said.
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