Carlson’s Iranian Fairytale: What Pezeshkian Won’t—and Can’t—Tell You
Tucker Carlson’s July interview with the Khomeinist regime’s installed president, Masoud Pezeshkian, was a soft-focus chat filled with slogans of “peace” and “dialogue.” Pezeshkian presented himself as a rational moderate, the man who could repair U.S.-Iran relations and calm regional tensions. It was theater—dangerous, deliberate, and deceitful.
Let us be clear: Pezeshkian is not a free actor. He is a mouthpiece for Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei. In the Khomeinist system, presidents are replaceable technocrats. Real power lies with the vali-ye faqih, the so-called “Supreme Leader,” who claims to rule by divine right as both political autocrat and religious overlord. Khamenei is not just a king, president, or prime minister. He is a marja-e taqlid—a “source of emulation” whose decisions cannot be questioned by law. Nothing Pezeshkian says means anything if Khamenei chooses to override it. And he often does.
So what value is there in this interview? None—except to expose the West’s chronic gullibility.
✔︎ Lie #1: “We don’t want war; Israel started everything.”
This is a grotesque reversal of history. Since its inception in 1979, the Islamic Regime has waged a relentless campaign against the United States and its allies—particularly Israel. The regime took 52 American hostages in 1979 and held them for 444 days. It was responsible for the 1983 Beirut barracks bombing that killed 241 U.S. Marines. It has funded terror proxies like Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthis, who chant “Death to America” and fire missiles at civilians. As recently as 2024, Iran-backed militias killed American troops in Iraq and Syria.
The regime’s entire identity is built on opposition to the United States, which it calls the “Great Satan.” This is not a slogan rooted in temporary foreign policy grievances—it is a theological imperative. Khomeinism was born as a rebellion not just against American influence, but against the very idea of secular, democratic governance. It is a millenarian, supremacist ideology that sees the Islamic Regime as the vanguard of a world revolution.
America has never been in a “forever war” against Iran. But Iran has been in a forever war against America since 1979.
✔︎ Lie #2: “We never wanted nuclear weapons. It’s against our religion.”
This claim, frequently trotted out by regime apologists, relies on the supposed fatwa by Ayatollah Khamenei prohibiting nuclear weapons. But no such fatwa has ever been published in full or registered with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) as a binding legal decree. It is propaganda—a moral smokescreen to obscure Iran’s decades-long nuclear deception.
From Natanz to Fordow, Iran has developed secret enrichment sites, denied inspectors access, and installed advanced centrifuges. The IAEA has documented numerous violations. Even under the JCPOA, Iran retained its enrichment infrastructure and resumed it almost immediately after the U.S. withdrawal. If Pezeshkian is to be believed, why did Iran enrich uranium up to 84% purity—just shy of weapons‑grade?
In fact, in 1988, thrust into emergency mode during the Iran‑Iraq War, IRGC commander Mohsen Rezaee secretly urged Ayatollah Khomeini to approve a nuclear weapons program, going through then‑Speaker (and future President) Rafsanjani as intermediary. Rezaee argued that Iran needed nuclear arms to avoid a humiliating defeat, citing a “shocking report” that prompted Khomeini to consider an existential weapons option—only abandoning it when the war ended in a ceasefire.
Furthermore, Iranian officials—especially in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and the hardline camp—have frequently floated the threat of NPT withdrawal as political blackmail during periods of diplomatic pressure.
Key examples:
January 2020: After the U.S. killed IRGC commander Qassem Soleimani, Iranian parliamentary officials publicly said Iran could exit the NPT if European powers referred its nuclear violations to the UN Security Council.
February 2020: Then Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif threatened withdrawal from the NPT if Europe continued “unjust” pressure under the JCPOA framework.
2022–2023: Hardliners, including former IRGC commanders, openly advocated abandoning the NPT as a response to IAEA censure and continued sanctions.
✔︎ Lie #3: “We’re ready for peace, but Israel sabotaged it.”
This is the regime’s favorite deflection: blame Netanyahu. Blame the Zionists. Pretend Iran is just a misunderstood victim of Israeli paranoia. Pezeshkian paints Iran as a peace-loving nation repeatedly robbed of diplomatic progress by Israeli sabotage. This claim is laughable.
Iran didn’t lose faith in diplomacy because Israel objected—it torpedoed diplomacy itself by violating its obligations. It was Iran that refused snap inspections, restarted enrichment, and stonewalled international monitors. It was Iran’s IRGC that plotted to assassinate U.S. and Israeli diplomats, including on American soil.
Carlson never pushes Pezeshkian on Iran’s ballistic missile program or on the IRGC Quds Force’s global operations. He never asks about Hezbollah’s tunnels or the precision-guided missile factories in Syria and Lebanon. Instead, Carlson—like Pezeshkian—pretends that diplomacy is stalled only because Israel fears an Iranian bomb.
But Israel’s fears are based on Iran’s own actions—not mere speculation.
✔︎ Lie #4: “Death to America doesn’t mean death to Americans.”
This linguistic gymnastics is a hallmark of the regime. According to Pezeshkian, when regime loyalists chant “Death to America,” they mean “death to crimes,” not people. This is absurd.
Words matter. “Death to America” is not a metaphor. It is a ritual chant at every state rally, Friday sermon, and IRGC parade. It is scrawled on missiles fired at American bases. It is taught to schoolchildren. The regime built its identity on opposition to America’s values—freedom, pluralism, secular government, and the dignity of the individual.
This is why Khomeinism is fundamentally incompatible with American nationhood. In the United States, authority derives from the consent of the governed. In the Islamic regime, authority derives from God—and is interpreted by a handful of elderly clerics. The American Declaration of Independence asserts that all men are created equal, endowed with inalienable rights. The Islamic regime asserts that the Umma must obey the Ulama and that dissent is a sin punishable by death.
You cannot build peace on these opposing visions of humanity. They are oil and water.
✔︎ Lie #5: “Iran has never harmed Americans.”
Another blatant lie. Besides the 1983 Marine barracks bombing in Beirut, Iran or its proxies were responsible for:
The 1996 Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia, which killed 19 U.S. airmen and wounded nearly 500. (Bonus evidence.)
Training and arming militias that killed hundreds of U.S. troops in Iraq.
Assassination plots targeting American officials and dissidents abroad.
Cyberattacks on U.S. financial institutions and infrastructure.
Bonus Evidence: Clinton’s Letter to Khatami
In June 1999, amid declassified documents later made public by the National Security Archive, President Bill Clinton sent a letter to Iran’s reformist president Mohammad Khatami in which he stated that the U.S. had “received credible evidence that members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps … were directly involved in the planning and execution of the terrorist bombing … of the Khobar Towers military resident complex.” He went on:
“The United States views this in the gravest terms … Those responsible … have yet to face justice for this crime. And the IRGC may be involved in planning for further terrorist attacks against American citizens.”
Despite assurances that Khatami was unelected at the time of the bombing, the letter made one thing clear: Tehran—not rogue actors—was directly implicated. Even while exploring diplomacy, the U.S. demand for justice was grounded in hard evidence, not rumor.
Iran didn’t just support these attacks—it celebrated them.
And now, it’s expanding its footprint across Latin America and Africa, embedding agents and building sleeper networks through diplomatic cover and business fronts. As recently as 2024, the Pentagon acknowledged that Iran-backed proxies were “the most persistent threat” to U.S. forces in the region.
✔︎ Lie #6: “There are no Iranian sleeper cells in America.”
Pezeshkian feigns ignorance when Carlson raises the issue of sleeper cells. But U.S. intelligence agencies have consistently warned of the Islamic Regime’s covert networks and proxy operations across American soil. Iranian operatives—often working through Hezbollah—have long established logistical and fundraising hubs in places like Long Island, New York, where surveillance and financial activity linked to Tehran’s proxies have been tracked for years.
The regime’s infiltration is not new. Khomeinist-aligned entities have quietly operated in areas like Westchester, NY for over five decades, cloaked in the form of religious foundations, academic institutes, and cultural associations. These organizations have not only served as platforms for influence and disinformation, but in some cases, as recruitment pipelines for sympathizers and operatives.
And contrary to the sanitized image Pezeshkian offers, sleeper cells are not always imported. The Islamic Regime has actively recruited supporters within the United States—naturalized citizens, dual nationals, students, and others—by exploiting diasporic ties, religious networks, and anti-Western ideological grievances. Similar recruitment efforts have taken place across Europe, Latin America, and West Africa, where Tehran and its proxies use embassies, educational exchanges, and religious missions as soft-power platforms to cultivate loyalty to the regime.
Open-border vulnerabilities further compound the threat. Under the Biden administration, U.S. border security has come under strain, allowing foreign actors—including potentially hostile operatives—to exploit legal and illegal entry channels. In early 2024, FBI Director Christopher Wray warned that Iran-backed threats to U.S. homeland security remain persistent and “evolve in sophistication,” especially given Tehran’s demonstrated interest in carrying out attacks on American soil through both direct and proxy means.
The Islamic Regime sees no distinction between military battlefields and civilian arenas. Its revolutionary project is transnational by design. And its operatives—whether trained in Qom, Beirut, Caracas, or Queens—ultimately report not to elected figures like Pezeshkian, but to the Supreme Leader and the Revolutionary Guard Corps who serve as enforcers of that project.
✔︎ Lie #7: “We want peace, we welcome American investors.”
This is economic bait-and-switch. Pezeshkian ends the interview by claiming that there are “no limits” for U.S. investors in Iran, and that Khamenei himself supports foreign investment. This is laughable, considering the regime’s seizure of Western hostages, shuttering of businesses, expropriation of property, and manipulation of currency markets. Even Chinese and Russian investors tread carefully in Iran.
The promise of peace and commerce is the oldest scam in Tehran’s book. It’s a way to get sanctions lifted, dollars flowing, and regime insiders rich. Then they turn around and fund Hamas and Hezbollah with the cash.
The New Isolationist Delusion
Carlson is not an investigative journalist—he is a revisionist ideologue. Like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and others of their stripe, he views the world through a provincial, America-first prism so distorted it becomes dangerous. His flavor of “isolationism” isn’t based on historical realism or prudence—it’s based on fantasy. He believes peace can be achieved if we just stop poking the hornet’s nest. But the hornets are already here, and they’ve been stinging for 46-plus years.
In ignoring Iran’s ideological mission, Carlson commits cultural imperialism in reverse—projecting American values onto a regime that explicitly rejects them. He assumes everyone wants the same things: safety, prosperity, and harmony. But the Islamic regime does not seek harmony. It seeks submission—first from Iranians, then from the rest of the world.
As commentators like Tucker Carlson and political figures such as Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene continue to promote sanitized narratives about the Islamic Regime—whether out of ideological alignment, political calculation, or willful detachment—they would do well to reflect on the moral weight of their positions. When they elevate regime figures like Pezeshkian without acknowledging the full scope of Iran’s record—from the hostage crisis of 1979 to the Khobar Towers bombing, from the killing of American troops to the imprisonment and torture of Iranian dissidents—they not only distort history; they trivialize suffering.
Those who choose to rehabilitate or normalize a regime responsible for decades of violence should consider offering something else as well: an apology. An apology to the families of the 241 U.S. Marines murdered in Beirut in 1983. To the hostages held blindfolded in Tehran for 444 days. To the families of Americans assassinated abroad. And to the countless Iranian citizens—students, journalists, women, and minorities—who remain behind bars, or who were executed for simply asking to live free.
To Carlson and his acolytes, the problem is America’s arrogance. But to the Iranian regime, America’s problem is liberty itself. Acknowledging these truths is not warmongering. It is a matter of principle. No responsible public figure should look away from them.