Vice President JD Vance responded to concerns from Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) over the looming Iran-U.S. peace deal, which the Hillbilly Elegy author helped to negotiate, on Monday morning.
“I’d caution Lindsey Graham and anybody else not to believe the hard-liner propaganda in Iran, but to believe what is actually in the agreement,” Vance told ABC anchor George Stephanopoulos on Good Morning America.
Vance said the deal is already signed digitally, though negotiators have yet to release a draft publicly. Graham, an outspoken Iran hawk and Trump ally, wrote on X on Sunday that he was “pleased to hear” that the deal had been agreed to, though he was “somewhat concerned that Iran’s view of the agreement seems different than what the American negotiating team is claiming.”
The deal does not mention Iranian proxies such as Hezbollah or Tehran’s missile program, according to Reuters. The United States may release half of Iran’s $24 billion in frozen assets before the next round of nuclear negotiations begin. Speculation has also swirled over a potential $300 billion Iranian reconstruction fund provided by the U.S. and its allies.
President Donald Trump disputed various media reports about the deal as “weak and pathetic” in a Friday Truth Social post.
“The idea of a $300 billion reconstruction fund, given who is in charge of Iran, seems to be tone deaf,” Graham subsequently wrote on X. “It would be akin to a Marshall Plan for Germany with the Nazis still in charge.”
“We’ll be releasing the text this week,” the vice president told Stephanopoulos. “And what everybody will see is that Iran doesn’t get a dime of money unless they perform their obligations.”
Graham said on Sunday that he looks forward to “reviewing the final product” with the vice president as part of the congressional review process.