{"id":396977,"date":"2026-01-09T09:49:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-09T09:49:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/396977\/"},"modified":"2026-01-09T09:49:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-09T09:49:09","slug":"iran-economy-on-the-ropes-treasury-secretary-bessent-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/396977\/","title":{"rendered":"Iran economy \u2018on the ropes,\u2019 Treasury Secretary Bessent says"},"content":{"rendered":"

Iran\u2019s<\/a> economy is facing high inflation and other challenges, partly due to U.S. sanctions, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said\u00a0on Thursday, underscoring Washington\u2019s concerns about Tehran cracking down violently on anti-regime protests.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe\u00a0Iranian economy is on the ropes,\u201d Bessent told the Economic Club of Minnesota, underscoring President Donald Trump\u2019s warning to Tehran to avoid harming protesters.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a very precarious moment. He does not want them to harm more of the protesters. This is a tense moment,\u201d the U.S. Treasury secretary said, referring to Trump\u2019s threat on Sunday to hit Tehran if it began killing protesters.<\/p>\n

Protests show Iran\u2019s grip on its people \u2018crumbling\u2019, senator says <\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re watching it very closely. If they start killing people like they have in the past, I think they\u2019re going to get hit very hard by the United States,\u201d Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on Sunday.<\/p>\n

Rights groups say at least 25 people were killed in\u00a0Iran\u00a0during the first nine days of protests that started in the bazaar of Tehran over the plunging value of the currency and soaring inflation, the biggest wave of dissent in three years.<\/p>\n

The protests have since spread nationwide amid deepening distress over rocketing inflation driven by mismanagement and Western sanctions, and curbs on political and social freedoms.<\/p>\n

Iranian authorities have acknowledged the economic hardships facing\u00a0Iranians, but accused networks linked to foreign powers of stoking the protests.\u00a0Iran\u2019s top judges\u00a0warned protesters on Wednesday there would be \u201cno leniency for those who help the enemy against the Islamic Republic.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bessent said it was clear that \u201cwhat had been an affluent society that still maintained a high standard of living is really crumbling, and a lot of that is through the sanctions.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said it was unclear how Tehran planned to finance the rebuilding of its nuclear program.<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s threat to come to the aid of protesters if security forces fire on them comes seven months after Israeli and U.S. forces bombed\u00a0Iranian nuclear sites in a 12-day war. Trump often references the U.S. and Israeli attacks\u00a0as\u00a0an example of what he sees as his strong leadership on global affairs.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.<\/p>\n

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to NewsNation. <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Iran\u2019s economy is facing high inflation and other challenges, partly due to U.S. sanctions, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":396978,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[28,191674,101,801,942,186940,4666,41499],"class_list":["post-396977","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economic-club-of-minnesota","tag-economy","tag-iran","tag-president-donald-trump","tag-protesters","tag-scott-bessent","tag-u-s-treasury"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396977","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=396977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396977\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/396978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=396977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=396977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=396977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}