{"id":272,"date":"2026-01-17T17:27:18","date_gmt":"2026-01-17T17:27:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/socializenews.com\/?p=272"},"modified":"2026-01-17T17:27:18","modified_gmt":"2026-01-17T17:27:18","slug":"trump-to-politico-its-time-to-look-for-new-leadership-in-iran","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/socializenews.com\/?p=272","title":{"rendered":"Trump to POLITICO: \u2018It\u2019s time to look for new leadership in Iran\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"is-first-paragraph font-text text-lg leading-[1.6] mt-5 md:mt-[1.875rem]\" data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">President Donald Trump on Saturday called for an end to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei\u2019s 37-year reign.<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-text text-lg leading-[1.6] mt-5 md:mt-[1.875rem]\" data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">\u201cIt\u2019s time to look for new leadership in Iran,\u201d Trump told POLITICO, as widespread protests calling for an end to the regime appear to have waned.<\/p>\n<div class=\"mx-auto max-w-[1350px] gap-x-[30px] px-5 text-center sm:px-[30px] md:grid md:grid-cols-[1fr,300px] lg:grid-cols-[300px,1fr,300px]\">\n<div class=\"mx-auto w-full max-w-[630px] text-left !w-full\">\n<div class=\"article-lead overflow-x-hidden break-words\">\n<div class=\"lead-box\">\n<div class=\"mx-auto max-w-[630px]\">\n<p class=\"font-text text-lg leading-[1.6] mt-5 md:mt-[1.875rem]\" data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">Thousands of protesters across the country were killed over the last three weeks, prompting Trump to repeatedly threaten military intervention. On Tuesday, Trump called on Iranians to keep protesting and \u201ctake over institutions,\u201d\u00a0<u>saying that \u201chelp is on its way.\u201d<\/u><img width=\"0\" height=\"0\" \/><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"mx-auto max-w-[1350px] gap-x-[30px] px-5 text-center sm:px-[30px] md:grid md:grid-cols-[1fr,300px] lg:grid-cols-[300px,1fr,300px]\">\n<div class=\"mx-auto w-full max-w-[630px] text-left\">\n<p class=\"font-text text-lg leading-[1.6] mt-5 md:mt-[1.875rem]\" data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">The next day, the president abruptly changed course, saying he had been informed that the killings had stopped.<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-text text-lg leading-[1.6] mt-5 md:mt-[1.875rem]\" data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">\u201cThe best decision he ever made was not hanging more than 800 people two days ago,\u201d Trump said Saturday, when asked about the size of a possible U.S. military operation in Iran.<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-text text-lg leading-[1.6] mt-5 md:mt-[1.875rem]\" data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">Trump\u2019s comments came shortly after Khamenei\u2019s X account posted a series of hostile messages aimed at Trump, accusing the U.S. president of being responsible for deadly violence and unrest in Iran.<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-text text-lg leading-[1.6] mt-5 md:mt-[1.875rem]\" data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">\u201cWe find the US President guilty due to the casualties, damages and slander he inflicted upon the Iranian nation,\u201d Khamenei\u00a0<u>wrote<\/u>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-text text-lg leading-[1.6] mt-5 md:mt-[1.875rem]\" data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">In\u00a0<u>another post<\/u>, he said Trump had mischaracterized violent groups as representing the Iranian people, calling it \u201can appalling slander.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-text text-lg leading-[1.6] mt-5 md:mt-[1.875rem]\" data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">Trump, after being read the posts, said Tehran\u2019s rulers rely on repression and violence to govern. \u201cWhat he is guilty of, as the leader of a country, is the complete destruction of the country and the use of violence at levels never seen before,\u201d Trump said. \u201cIn order to keep the country functioning \u2014 even though that function is a very low level \u2014 the leadership should focus on running his country properly, like I do with the United States, and not killing people by the thousands in order to keep control.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-text text-lg leading-[1.6] mt-5 md:mt-[1.875rem]\" data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">\u201cLeadership is about respect, not fear and death,\u201d Trump added.<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-text text-lg leading-[1.6] mt-5 md:mt-[1.875rem]\" data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">The exchange underscores a sharpening rhetoric between Washington and Tehran at a volatile moment for the region, and as Khamenei recently made\u00a0<u>a public address<\/u>\u00a0in which he claimed that \u201cthe Iranian nation has defeated America.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-text text-lg leading-[1.6] mt-5 md:mt-[1.875rem]\" data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">Trump went further in personal terms, denouncing Khamenei and the Iranian system of governance.<\/p>\n<p class=\"font-text text-lg leading-[1.6] mt-5 md:mt-[1.875rem]\" data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">\u201cThe man is a sick man who should run his country properly and stop killing people,\u201d Trump said. \u201cHis country is the worst place to live anywhere in the world because of poor leadership.\u201d<\/p>\n<p data-v-a500cf4d=\"\">\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>President Donald Trump on Saturday called for an end to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei\u2019s 37-year reign. \u201cIt\u2019s time to look for new leadership in Iran,\u201d Trump&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":273,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[30,111,46],"class_list":["post-272","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-donald-trump","tag-iran","tag-trump"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/socializenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/socializenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/socializenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/socializenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/socializenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=272"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/socializenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":274,"href":"https:\/\/socializenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272\/revisions\/274"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/socializenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/273"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/socializenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=272"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/socializenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=272"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/socializenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=272"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}