Trump urges Iranians to ‘take over institutions’

“Help is on its way,” the US president has told protesters in a cryptic message

President Donald Trump has called for protesters in Iran to seize control of state institutions, issuing a cryptic promise of US assistance and threatening severe consequences for Iranian officials.

Iranian authorities have repeatedly alleged that the US and Israel have had a “big hand” in the ongoing unrest, framing it as a foreign-backed “terrorist war.”

“All Iranian patriots, keep protesting,” Trump declared in a speech to the Detroit Economic Club on Tuesday and in a parallel post on Truth Social. “Take over your institutions if possible. And save the names of the killers and the abusers that are abusing you,” he added, promising they would “pay a very big price.”

The protests, which began in late December over a collapsing national currency, have reportedly resulted in hundreds of deaths. Western media and activist groups claim the casualty figure is in the thousands. Trump has said he is unsure of the true numbers, emphasizing that his response would depend on verified facts.

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“We’re going to get some accurate numbers... The killing looks like it’s significant, but we don’t know yet for certain,” he told reporters.

When pressed to clarify what “help is on its way” entails, Trump gave a broad answer in a CBS News interview. “Well there’s a lot of help on the way and in different forms including economic help from our standpoint and not going to help Iran very much,” he said, referencing newly implemented tariffs on any country doing business with Iran.

Trump did not rule out military action, citing past US military actions in Venezuela and the assassinations of ISIS leader al-Baghdadi and Iranian General Qasem Soleimani as examples of his policy.

“The end game is to win. I like winning,” he said.

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Tehran has previously warned that it could target US forces in the Middle East if Washington tries to intervene.

On Monday, the US State Department warned all American citizens in Iran to “leave now,” citing a high risk of arbitrary detention and the potential for sudden escalation. Several other countries, including Canada, Australia, Germany, and France, have issued similar warnings to their citizens.

Moscow has accused the West of seeking to “destroy the Iranian state” by exploiting economic protests to engineer a “color revolution.” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova blamed U.S. sanctions for causing the social crisis and condemned Trump’s threats of force as “absolutely unacceptable.”