President Donald Trump threatened Iran on Saturday as Vice President JD Vance headed to Switzerland to lead diplomatic negotiations, according to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, which published the story late Saturday night Hawaii time.
The dual moves — one confrontational, one diplomatic — put the administration on two tracks at once, with Trump signaling potential consequences for Tehran while his vice president sat down at the negotiating table overseas.
Background
Iran and the United States have been locked in a prolonged standoff over Tehran’s nuclear program. Talks have stalled and restarted multiple times across administrations, and any new round of negotiations carries significant uncertainty about whether either side will move from prior positions.
Vance’s role as lead negotiator in Switzerland marks an unusual use of a sitting vice president in direct diplomatic engagement — though the specific terms being discussed, and who represented Iran at the table, weren’t detailed in early reporting.
Trump’s threat, issued alongside the talks, wasn’t immediately clarified in terms of what action he was signaling or what timeline he had in mind. Whether the pressure was coordinated with Vance’s mission or ran counter to it remained unclear as of Sunday morning.
The State Department hadn’t issued a statement on the Switzerland meetings as of the time of publication.
Reported by the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. Read the original report.
