Trump’s Iran war now has a midterm election problem

United States President Donald Trump has claimed that the seven-month-long war with Iran will end “immediately after” the US midterm elections in ‌November, framing the ongoing conflict as an attempt by Tehran to influence the vote.

“They’re desperate to try and affect the election,” he told reporters on Wednesday.

Trump’s latest claims of Iranian capitulation are not new. Tehran has thus far withstood sustained strikes by the US and Israel intended to eradicate its military capacity, as well as a naval blockade of Iran’s ports intended to choke the country’s economy. In late August, the US ratcheted up the economic pressure even further, threatening secondary sanctions on Iran’s trading partners.

“It was a statement that was more likely meant for an internal [domestic] audience,” Ali Alavi, an Iran lecturer at SOAS University of London, said of Trump’s predictions of Iran’s post-election collapse. ”It was Trump’s method of communicating that the only reason it seemed as though he was failing in his Iran policy before the midterms is because Iran wanted it to be perceived that way.”

The cost of Iran’s failure to capitulate is being felt across the United States ahead of the midterms, which could see Trump’s Republican Party lose one or both houses of Congress.

Petrol prices – a key measure of the cost of living in the world’s largest economy – have climbed to a national average of $4.27 a gallon according to the American Automobile Association, up nearly 30 percent from a year ago.

Trump’s approval rating has also plunged from the high-40s when he returned to office in January 2025 to the low-to-mid 30s today.

The US electorate’s pain extends beyond the pump. A 2026 LendingTree survey found that 29 percent of buy-now-pay-later users had used the loans to buy groceries, while 47 percent said they had paid late on a buy-now-pay-later loan at least once in the past year.