Trump threatens Iran again as ceasefire deadline looms, U.S. gears up for peace talks

President Donald Trump on Monday again threatened Iran with overwhelming military force, saying “lots of bombs [will] start going off” if no deal is reached before a shaky ceasefire with Tehran expires Tuesday evening.

The latest threat, made in a phone call with a PBS News reporter, came as the status of additional U.S.-Iran peace talks, and other key details on the current relationship between the warring powers, have grown increasingly opaque.

At the same time, Trump has resumed his saber-rattling rhetoric, which had escalated two weeks ago before the expiring fragile ceasefire was reached. Trump, in phone calls with reporters over the past two days, has vacillated between warmongering and offering unclear details about further negotiations.

Specifics about a potential deal also remain fuzzy. The Trump administration has stated repeatedly that Iran must never be allowed to obtain a nuclear weapon, and the president said Friday that the U.S. would also get what he has referred to as the “Dust” left after last year’s bombing of Iranian nuclear sites.

He has also demanded that Iran fully reopen the Strait of Hormuz to ship traffic, which has slowed to a trickle since the war began on Feb. 28. The de facto closure of the key shipping route has sent global oil prices spiraling, giving Iran a major source of leverage and spurring the U.S. to impose a retaliatory naval blockade of Iran’s ports in the middle of the ceasefire.

Trump in a Truth Social post Monday afternoon boasted that the blockade is “absolutely destroying Iran” and declared that it will not be lifted until a deal is struck.

In another post, the president insisted that the deal being made with Iran “will be FAR BETTER” than the Obama-era agreement known as the Iran nuclear deal, which Trump scrapped during his first term in office.

Trump, while lashing out at his perceived critics, also stated he does not feel obligated to cut a deal within six weeks, his initial prediction for the length of the war. “I’m not going to let them rush the United States into making a Deal that is not as good as it could have been,” Trump wrote.

Article source: https://www.cnbc.com/2026/04/20/trump-defense-iran-war-pakistan-vance-witkoff-kushner.html