Rose Garden, Eleven O’Clock — The President Steps Out at 11:02 Eastern Time, Declares the Iran War “Won, Done, Closed,” Signs Executive Order 14211 Lifting the First Tranche of Sanctions on Iranian Oil Exports, Names “Phase Two” on Russia and Ukraine, Tells the Press the Ballroom Will Be Built “Bigger, Faster, More Secure” and Walks Off the Lectern Without Taking the Three Questions Shouted After Him
President Donald J. Trump stepped out of the Oval Office and onto the Rose Garden lectern at two minutes past eleven Eastern time on Friday morning, took the seven-page binder his Staff Secretary had set on the lectern at quarter to eleven, and delivered the seventeen-minute statement that closed the prosecution phase of the Iran war and opened the diplomatic phase on Russia and Ukraine. He declared the war “won, done, closed.” He signed Executive Order 14211, which lifts the first tranche of sanctions on Iranian crude exports under the Doha framework, with the gold pen the Office of the Staff Secretary had pre-positioned on the resolute desk replica that was carried out of the Oval at quarter past ten. He named “Phase Two” on Russia and Ukraine. He told the press the White House ballroom — the project that the Senate Democrats parked a billion-dollar security line on yesterday afternoon — will be built “bigger, faster, more secure.” He walked off the lectern at 11:19 without taking the three questions shouted after him by the press pool.
The Seventeen Minutes
The statement ran seventeen minutes and twelve seconds on the C-SPAN clock. The President opened by naming, in order, the Secretary of State, the Treasury Secretary, the Vice President and the National Security Advisor. He read the words “won, done, closed” in the third paragraph, paused for the four seconds the speechwriting team had marked in the binder, and resumed on the line that “the deal we have made with Iran is the strongest deal made by any president of the United States in the modern history of this country.” He named the Iranian President, Masoud Pezeshkian, on one occasion and the Iranian Supreme Leader on no occasion. He named the Pakistani Prime Minister, Shehbaz Sharif, on three. He named the Emir of Qatar on two. He named, on no occasion, the Pope. The omission, on the testimony of one White House official, was the most carefully drafted single line of the binder.
Executive Order 14211
Executive Order 14211, signed at 11:14 Eastern time and posted to the Federal Register at 11:23, lifts the first tranche of OFAC sanctions on Iranian crude exports under the Doha framework. The order rescinds, in its operative paragraph, the secondary-sanctions designations imposed on twelve Iranian crude carriers under Executive Order 13902 of January 2020 and authorises the Treasury, on a case-by-case general license to be posted by Tuesday, the receipt by United States banks of Iranian crude proceeds for transactions cleared through the Doha banking channel. The order is conditioned, in its second paragraph, on the maintenance of the thirty-day enrichment moratorium agreed at Doha. It is reversible, in its third paragraph, on a single presidential certification that the moratorium has been broken. The text was drafted, on the testimony of two Treasury officials, in three days at the OFAC Office of Foreign Assets Control, with two further days of clearance at the National Security Council. It is the first sanctions-relief executive order of the second Trump administration.
“Phase Two”
The President named “Phase Two” on Russia and Ukraine in the eleventh paragraph of the binder. The line, on the testimony of one White House official, was added to the speechwriting draft at quarter past nine on Friday morning, after the Vice President’s mid-morning conversation with the Secretary of State on the Riyadh ministerial cabin call. The substance of Phase Two, on the testimony of two State Department officials, follows the same single-page memorandum methodology that produced the Doha framework. The Special Envoy, Steve Witkoff, who closed the Doha channel between Tuesday and Thursday of this week, will fly to Geneva on Sunday afternoon to open a single-page channel between the United States, Russia and Ukraine. The Ukrainian Defence Secretary, Rustem Umerov, who was in Miami yesterday afternoon with Mr Witkoff and Mr Kushner, will be in Geneva on Monday morning. The Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, on the testimony of the same officials, has been invited and has not yet responded.
The Ballroom Line
The President addressed the White House ballroom in the fourteenth paragraph. The construction project, the privately-funded billion-dollar reception hall the second Trump administration has been raising on the East Wing site since February, has been the centre of a Senate appropriations fight this week. The Senate Democrats parked a Republican request for a one-billion-dollar federal security line on the project at the Wednesday cloture vote, and the House Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries, has drafted a standalone resolution to break the security line out of the ICE funding plan and force a separate floor vote next week. The President named the ballroom on three occasions in the fourteenth paragraph and used the words “bigger, faster, more secure” in the closing line. He did not address the security-line appropriation. He did not name Senator Schumer. He did not name Speaker Johnson. He did not name Leader Jeffries. The Senate Democrats’ spokesman, on a brief statement issued at noon Eastern time, called the Rose Garden line “a binder substitute for an answer.”
The Three Questions Shouted
The President turned at 11:19 and walked off the lectern. The three questions shouted by the press pool, on the C-SPAN audio, were, in order: “Mister President, on the war powers vote —” (Major Garrett, CBS), “Mister President, on the Pope —” (Anita Kumar, Politico) and “Mister President, on the Acton primary —” (Yamiche Alcindor, NBC). The President did not turn. He walked through the colonnade, into the West Wing, past the Cabinet Room and into the Oval Office. The seventeen-minute statement was, on the testimony of three Rose Garden journalists, the longest unbroken Rose Garden statement of the second term and the first that did not end in a press question. The Press Secretary, on the briefing room note circulated at half past eleven, said the President would not take questions on Friday. The afternoon briefing was cancelled.
The Senate Floor
The Senate floor reaction ran on three lines through the afternoon. The Majority Leader, John Thune, took the floor at 11:48 Eastern time and read a four-paragraph statement welcoming the executive order, naming the Doha framework as “the strongest piece of bipartisan work the Senate has touched in eleven months” and committing the Republican conference to a Tuesday floor vote on the parallel sanctions-relief enabling legislation that the Foreign Relations Committee marked up at six on Thursday evening. The Minority Leader, Charles Schumer, took the floor at 12:11 and parked the Tuesday vote on the standing seventh-cloture procedure. Senator Tim Kaine, who has carried the war powers position on the Foreign Relations Committee for the entire prosecution phase, told reporters in the corridor at quarter to one that the executive order “closes the war but does not close the war powers question,” and committed to filing a privileged resolution next week.
What the Day Has Decided
What Friday morning has decided is that the prosecution phase of the Iran war is closed and the sanctions-relief phase is open. What Friday morning has not decided is whether the war powers question, the ballroom appropriation and the Phase Two channel on Russia and Ukraine close on the President’s schedule or on the Senate’s. The honest verdict, on the evidence of the seventeen minutes, the gold pen and the three shouted questions, is that the President closed the largest single foreign-policy file of the second term at half past eleven Eastern time on Friday morning, and that the smaller files behind it now have his full attention.