How the Iran war is shaping the US midterm vote, according to guests on Inside Story

The conflict has become a central issue ahead of Tuesday's polls, and voters say it has caused their living expenses to soar. The program asked what effect the result might have on the rest of Donald Trump's presidency.

Fuel prices have skyrocketed and pushed up the prices of other goods as well, which makes rising cost of living one of the few bipartisan frustrations of these elections.

Since the US attacked Iran in February, the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz has disrupted supply chains and pushed up prices around the world, particularly fuel. That has contributed to a global cost of living crisis, and the US is no exception.

At a Democratic rally, one voter said gas prices, child care, housing and inflation were all out of control and that people had to vote because their vote changes what happens in the world. Another said ending the war in Iran would hopefully bring gas prices down.

Recent polls cited in the report say nearly 70% of voters believe the war on Iran was not worth fighting, and many Republicans agree. Some 71% disapprove of Trump's handling of it.

During his election campaign Trump promised no new wars. Since returning to the presidency, however, he has ordered multiple military strikes abroad, including bombing Iran.

A Reuters Ipsos poll days before the midterms suggested Trump's approval rating had dipped to 32%. The report noted that presidents are not on the ballot in midterms but can shift the balance of power in Congress during their term, and that Trump has been highly visible on the campaign trail even as some Republican candidates have distanced themselves from him over the Iran war.

Trump says he won't renew attacks until the elections are over and that the war may be over soon. He has also said of Tehran that its leaders are not very reliable, will say they will make a deal and then back out, and want a deal when they are in a hurry because the US has knocked out their navy.

Iran says the Strait of Hormuz will remain closed until its conditions are met, and the report said Iran wants the US to suffer.

An Iranian official argued that if Trump and America are not punished, other countries will think they can attack Iran without paying a price. In the official's words, the most important deterrent is to end the war in a way that ensures no one ever dares attack Iran again.

The report concluded that voters may be thinking about global politics as much as the price at the pump when they go to the polls.

Presenter Mohammed Jamjoom introduced his guests: Hassan Ahmadian in the Doha studio, Patrick Mara in Washington, and James Butler, also in Washington. He asked Ahmadian whether Iran believes the war will have a major impact on the midterms and how much the results might shape Iran's strategy.

Ahmadian said that in the short run Iran is not banking much on the elections and is playing a longer game. Elections add value to Iran's strategy, which is focused not only on US domestic politics but also on energy markets and geostrategic developments in the region.

He said two years of the Trump administration remain. In his view, a Congress that restrains the administration within the United States works far better for Iran than one that appeases Trump. Iran, he said, sees the energy market having an impact on that and has been playing on it.

Mara said the war has had an impact and will have an impact on election day. The question, he said, is how much that impact lines up with the polls being seen.

He noted that for voters of both parties the effects of the Iran war are very much on their minds, with fuel prices skyrocketing and other goods spiking, and that many polls show the war is unpopular.

Mara said that in this case the largest issue is gas prices. Gas and diesel prices, and the overall increase in costs, are things Americans do not like.

Mara said Trump ran on no foreign wars and became popular when he first ran in 2015 by openly saying the Iraq war was not right. He used different terms, he said, but opposed the war in Iraq, and this resonated with many MAGA voters, many of whom will still turn out.

The open question, Mara said, is whether low-propensity Trump-leaning voters who were driven to the polls in 2024 will come out again. He argued that because these midterms are regional and state-by-state, candidate quality matters.

He pointed to Michigan and Maine, where Republicans Mike Rogers and Susan Collins have distanced themselves from Trump by saying the Iran war must end and ways must be found to bring gas prices down. Mara said that outcome on Tuesday will depend largely on candidate quality in these states and districts, though the Iran war has certainly had an impact that has been baked in for some time.

Butler said foreign policy typically does not decide elections unless it is a major extended war, but here it does. He said the war hits a dinner-table topic: voters cannot leave it behind because it is so intertwined with cost.

He argued that independents in particular put Trump in the White House in 2024 because they believed he could make the country more affordable, while the war he had sworn against has caused a global energy crisis that has driven prices up. Americans, he said, feel the pinch everywhere they go.

Butler said voters can no longer be reassured that everything is okay, because they feel it at the gas pump, in healthcare and in housing costs. In his view foreign policy matters this time because it is inseparable from affordability, and Democrats will pay a heavy price, not only in the Senate but in the House as well.

Asked to clarify whether he had said Democrats would pay a heavy price in the House and Senate, Butler said he may have misspoken. He said Republicans, not Democrats, will pay a heavy price in both chambers. He apologised if he had said otherwise.

Asked how a Democratic House and Senate would change Iran's negotiations and its decisions on the Strait of Hormuz, Ahmadian said there is no love between Iran and either party. In his understanding, both are focused on making sure that an administration which backed Israel's bombing of Iran pays a heavy political price, so that any future administration thinks twice about attacking Iran.

He said a weaker administration, bogged down domestically, is more appealing to deal with than one that believes it is very strong, having blown up Iran's navy and air force. The confidence Trump's administration has now would not be there if it lost Congress.

If the administration loses Congress, Ahmadian said, it would give Iran leverage over the administration in future negotiations. He noted that Iran has negotiated with this administration before, signing an MOU that was trashed after weeks, and that Iran was bombed again in June.

He said Iran does not want to see that again and believes a weaker administration will not be as intent on doing so.

Presenter Jamjoom noted reports that Trump may be considering attacking Iran again, possibly within days or after the midterm elections, and asked why he would continue if the war has been a drag on his popularity. Mara said these were still only reports, though Trump has said repeatedly that the US will attack Iran militarily after the midterms.

Mara said reporting indicates a post-election US attack would focus on Iranian leadership, nuclear sites, infrastructure and energy sites. He noted that past US actions, which CENTCOM has called defensive strikes, targeted weapon storage and radar used by the IRGC, and that such strikes would most likely be airstrikes.

Mara said Trump has argued since the beginning that the US entered Iran over the nuclear issue. He cited the Pickaxe Mountain site, about 440 kg of 60% enriched uranium that remains in Iran, and US Space Force monitoring of nuclear sites. In Mara's words, we can't just leave Iran at this point.

Butler said control of the purse strings means control over whether the war moves forward. He said no one is suggesting the war would end immediately if Democrats take the House and Senate, but it would be done in a responsible and sensible way. He said most Americans, Democrats included, believe the war should never have started.

Butler argued that fully disarming a nuclear or potentially nuclear Iran would be very difficult without boots on the ground. He said assets have moved into the area in recent weeks, so there will probably be military movements within the next weeks, which he said is still uncertain but suggests the US is not moving such assets without intent to strike.

The Democratic approach, Butler said, is to stop funding the war as a responsible wind-down, continue negotiations for Iranian disarmament and relinquishment of its nuclear ambitions, and pursue diplomatic talks with international support, which would also open the Strait.

Presenter Jamjoom asked Ahmadian whether there is a credible pathway back to negotiations. Ahmadian said Pakistan and, more lately, Qatar have been trying to bridge the gaps, and that Qatar has been strongly involved in Tehran and Washington.

He said Iran was attacked twice while negotiating, so it does not let its guard down and readies itself for the next fight, which is what Iran hears more than negotiations. Still, Iran's preferred outcome is a deal like the MOU it signed, after which it went into talks with Oman on a protocol to open the Strait.

Ahmadian said the Americans did not like that arrangement because Trump was attacked internally and paid a political price, so they reneged on their commitment. He said Iran still wants a political outcome, but when officials such as Trump and the Secretary of War talk about striking Iran, it pushes Tehran to think twice about negotiating with this administration.

Ahmadian said the White House announcement that Iran's nuclear programme had been obliterated, made after the 12-day war, is still on its website. He said the nuclear rhetoric returned in this war and that the same claims are being heard again.

He said he never thought the US had much concern about Iran's nuclear programme, because in 2015 Iran signed a deal that capped its programme, which he described as the most intrusively overseen programme in the world by the IAEA, and the agency reported for four years that Iran was not reneging on its commitments.

In Ahmadian's view, the US acted on Israel's behalf in this war and would do so again in another, and opening the Strait and returning to calm is not that hard, since the MOU showed the way. He said many believe Israel has leverage over Trump himself, which is why he keeps doing its bidding.

Asked whether Republican senators will distance themselves from Trump if Republicans lose control of the Senate, particularly over the Iran war, Mara first gave the IAEA figures: about 440 kg of 60% enriched uranium remains in Iran, of which 200 kg is in a tunnel in Isfahan, and that could be enriched to over 90% within weeks, enough to make 10 nuclear devices, according to him.

Butler said the first objective of the Democrats is to put checks and balances on Trump. Winning the House alone would give less ability to stifle what he called an overly aggressive White House than winning both chambers.

He said the Democrats believe the war should not have happened and was a war of choice to carry out Israel's wishes. The plan is to rein Trump in by gaining support even from Republicans who do not find the war popular, refusing to fund it, and then showing Americans a focus on dinner-table affordability and ending the global energy crisis in a sensible way.