AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
The war with Iran has rolled into its fourth month with no clear sign of an agreement. Right now, the two countries are negotiating the terms of a further extended ceasefire. But an actual peace deal that addresses Iran's nuclear program is, for now, nowhere in sight. We're joined by NPR senior political correspondent Tamara Keith. Good morning, Tam.
TAMARA KEITH, BYLINE: Hey, Ayesha.
RASCOE: For over a week, we've been hearing a deal is coming. It's imminent. And on Friday, Vice President JD Vance told reporters that President Trump was close to signing the agreement. Do we have a sense of, like, what's driving this delay?
KEITH: Yeah. On Friday, President Trump announced he was heading into the Situation Room for a high-level meeting about the potential deal, quote, "to make a final determination." He was there for two hours, and we still don't know what he decided. Over the past two months, there have been many threats from President Trump and claims of a deal being near. Then, last week he said he might not even sign the deal unless Gulf Arab states like Qatar sign the Abraham Accord, normalizing relations with Israel. The Strait of Hormuz continues to be functionally closed. There's still no announced plan to remove nuclear material from Iran. But Trump said in a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday, he's patient.
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PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: They thought they were going to outwait me, you know? We'll outwait him. He's got the midterms. I don't care about the midterms. Look what happened last night. That was the prelude to the midterms.
KEITH: He was referring to his chosen candidate winning the Republican primary for the U.S. Senate seat in Texas. But I don't care about the midterms after two weeks earlier saying he doesn't think about Americans' financial situation, even in the context of Iran negotiations is just not what Republicans facing difficult elections want to hear.
RASCOE: OK. But it does seem like he does care about the midterms - right? - or at least in some sense.
KEITH: Oh, he cares. Otherwise, he wouldn't be pushing so hard to have district lines redrawn to favor Republicans. But saying he doesn't think about America's financial situation is not good midterm messaging. I'm following about a dozen swing voters as part of a project called Swing Shift. And I asked them how gas prices are affecting them, and even those who still love Trump are feeling real pain. One said she's thinking about her kids and telling them they're going to have to give up something to keep filling the tank. As for politicians, she said, I guess their pockets are deeper than mine.
RASCOE: And President Trump, he made a very different announcement yesterday, saying he's going to headline a festival on the National Mall after a bunch of musical acts pulled out, many of them that were, like, last popular in the 1980s and, you know, '90s.
KEITH: Yeah. There's a great American state fair planned to mark America's 250th birthday. Think like a world's fair type event. Well, no sooner did the Freedom 250 committee announce the lineup, then artists started pulling out because of the association with Trump, including Milli Vanilli, the German pop duo that was busted for lip syncing, though only one of them is still alive. In a pair of social media posts, Trump called the musicians pulling out third-rate artists and said they would be replaced with the, quote, "No. 1 attraction anywhere in the world, the man who gets much larger audiences than Elvis in his prime." So the organizers scrambled to add another day at the start of this great American state fair so President Trump can kick it off. You know, in this era, everything becomes about Trump.
RASCOE: So a couple of legal decisions dropped on Friday. In one, a judge ruled that the president's name needed to be removed from the Kennedy Center, and then another, the judge temporarily blocked payouts from a $1.8 billion fund that could've been used to pay January 6 rioters. What did the president say about those decisions?
KEITH: Well, he attacked the judge involved in the Kennedy Center case on social media. As for the so-called Anti-Weaponization Fund, this was a temporary pause ahead of legal arguments. But the fund faces challenges on multiple fronts, legal and political. A significant number of Republicans in Congress have raised serious concerns, and there appear to be enough votes to block it, should it come to that. This fund is just the latest example of President Trump prioritizing his personal agenda over the political fortunes of his party in the second term. An incomplete list here, but it includes the White House ballroom obsession, trying to put his face on money and the Justice Department investigating the president's enemies.
RASCOE: That's NPR's Tamara Keith. Thank you so much for speaking with us today.
KEITH: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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