U.S. President Donald Trump said Thursday that he will not order a resumption of military strikes on Iran before the Nov. 3 midterm elections in the United States.
Trump, while stumping for Republicans this week, has hinted that was confident that at endgame to the war cold come in the days before or after the election, while also hinting that he remained open to resuming full-scale military operations against Iran.
For weeks, Trump has been threatening that a post-midterm election escalation in the seven-month-old war remains a viable option, despite his initial promises to Americans of a military campaign that would last a matter of weeks.
But Trump in a social media post on Thursday said the U.S. “will not be attacking Iran at any time prior to the Midterm Elections to be held in the United States on November 3rd.”
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Trump added that his team has been “having productive discussions with the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
Negotiations had appeared at a standstill since Trump late last month publicly rejected Iran’s proposal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz within seven days if the U.S. met certain conditions.
Iran, however, said last week they had received a U.S. counterproposal. And Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on Thursday said he expected Tehran would offer a formal reply within days.
Trump’s post comes as the military has dispatched more resources to the region. U.S. officials have said a third aircraft carrier, the USS Theodore Roosevelt, and thousands of troops aboard it and accompanying ships could arrive as early as the end of October.
Trump’s announcement was made the same day the USS Abraham Lincoln was due to arrive to its home port in San Diego after a record-long deployment in support of the Iran war. There have been reports of crew stress and poor mental health, as well as supply shortages, including food and hygiene products.
The USS George Washington, which is usually based in Asia, relieved the Lincoln in August. The other aircraft carrier in the Middle East, the USS George H.W. Bush, has been deployed for about six months, but it pulled into Phuket, Thailand, for a port visit several days ago.
Daniel are you bored or something 😂😂😂😂
Stupid President Trump. You just told Iran when the best time to strike.
I love apple pie and ice cream! Thanks President TRUMP!
@daniel plainview, are you in a mental institution? Just asking
Just f *ucking nuke those muslims.
LOOSER!!!
The poor sods are CLUELESS.
The war with Iran is real. The Strait of Hormuz is constrained. Fuel exports are disrupted. That is a factor. But if you stop there you will never understand why $6 diesel is happening now when crude oil is not even close to its all time high.
Crude oil hit $100 per barrel this week. That sounds like a lot until you adjust for inflation. In 2008, crude hit $147 per barrel. Adjusted to today’s dollars that is over $210. In 1980 during the Iranian Revolution, crude hit $36 per barrel. Adjusted to today’s dollars that is over $160. The current price of crude is well below both of those peaks in real terms.
But diesel was never $6 during those crises. Not in 1980. Not in 2008. Not ever.
The barrel price does not explain $6 diesel. Something else does. And that something else is the part nobody in Washington wants to talk about.
Between 2020 and 2026, 11 major U.S. oil refineries permanently closed or stopped refining crude oil. Not temporarily shut down. Permanently gone. The combined capacity lost is approximately 1.72 million barrels per day gross, roughly 900,000 barrels per day net after accounting for some expansions at remaining facilities.
These were not small operations. Philadelphia Energy Solutions in Pennsylvania, 335,000 barrels per day. Shell Convent in Louisiana, 211,146 barrels per day. Phillips 66 Alliance in Belle Chasse, Louisiana, 255,000 barrels per day. Marathon Petroleum in Martinez, California, 161,000 barrels per day. LyondellBasell in Houston, 263,776 barrels per day. Phillips 66 in Los Angeles, 138,700 barrels per day. Valero in Benicia, California, 145,000 barrels per day. And several more.
U.S. refining capacity went from a record high of 18.98 million barrels per day at the start of 2020 to approximately 17.9 million by early 2022. The lowest level since 2014. It has continued declining since.
The Energy Information Administration said it plainly. “Typically, we don’t see capacity close and then reopen in the same operating mode, so we think it’s safe to say that the refineries that have closed are probably shuttered for good.”
These companies did not lose these refineries in a fire or a hurricane and never recover. They made a business decision. Demand dropped during COVID. Margins tightened. And instead of weathering the downturn and maintaining capacity for the recovery that everyone knew was coming, they permanently closed facilities, removed the capacity from the market forever, and waited.
When demand came roaring back in 2021 and 2022, the capacity was gone. Fewer refineries processing crude into fuel meant less supply of diesel and gasoline. Less supply meant higher prices. Higher prices meant wider margins. And wider margins meant the largest profits in the history of the refining industry.
The refining margin is called the crack spread. It is the difference between what a refiner pays for a barrel of crude oil and what they earn selling the refined products. From 2010 to 2021, the historical average crack spread was $10 to $16 per barrel. That was normal. That was steady. For over a decade.
In 2022, when the Russia-Ukraine war disrupted European fuel supply while U.S. refining capacity was still depleted from the closures, crack spreads exploded to $50 to $60 per barrel. Three to four times the historical norm.
In 2023 and 2024, spreads came down to $15 to $25. Closer to normal. Prices at the pump came down some. But they never went back to where they were before. The floor had been permanently raised.
Now in 2026, with the Iran war disrupting the Strait of Hormuz and Ukrainian drones hitting Russian refineries, crack spreads have surged past even the 2022 records. And the companies that removed the capacity are harvesting the consequences.
Marathon Petroleum, Valero Energy, and Phillips 66 collectively earned $12.6 billion in the second quarter of 2026 alone. Their highest combined quarterly result since 2022. Their stock prices are surging. Forbes reported in July that refining stocks are soaring as crack spreads hit record highs.
Marathon is the company that permanently closed its Martinez, California and Gallup, New Mexico refineries during COVID.
Phillips 66 is the company that closed its Alliance refinery in Louisiana after Hurricane Ida, closed its Rodeo and Santa Maria facilities in California, and closed its Los Angeles refinery in October 2025.
Valero is the company that ceased operations at its Benicia, California refinery in early 2026.
The same companies that removed the capacity are the same companies posting record profits from the scarcity that removal created.
And here is where it becomes something more than just a market story.
Before COVID, the oil and gas industry spent roughly $55 to $68 million per election cycle on political contributions to federal candidates and parties. That was the steady state for a decade. $56 million in 2018. $63 million in 2020.
In the 2024 election cycle, the oil and gas industry spent $219 million to influence the election. $67 million directly to candidates. $151 million in outside spending through PACs and super PACs. 88% of it went to Republicans.
From $63 million in 2020 to $219 million in 2024. A 247% increase in a single cycle.
Annual lobbying went from $112 million in 2020 to $154 million in 2024. The American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers, the trade group that specifically represents refining companies, doubled its own lobbying budget from a $3.4 million annual average to $6.9 million starting in 2023, the same year its members were posting record profits from constrained supply.
The refiners’ trade group doubled its lobbying the same year the refiners posted their highest profits from the capacity they deliberately destroyed.
Valero tripled its political contributions from the 2022 cycle to the 2024 cycle. $1.78 million to $5.66 million. This is the same company that closed its Benicia refinery in early 2026, removing another 145,000 barrels per day, and posted billions in quarterly profits.
And what are those politicians doing with all that money and all that influence?
They are not investigating why diesel is at $6 when crude does not justify it. They are not holding hearings on refining margins. They are not asking why companies that permanently removed capacity are posting record profits from the scarcity they created. They are not proposing legislation to incentivize new refining capacity or to regulate crack spreads that are running 3 to 5 times their historical average.
They are doing nothing. Because the money has purchased their silence.
This is the story that neither side of the political argument wants you to see. Blaming Trump and the Iran war is convenient because it puts the problem on one man and one policy decision. Defending Trump by saying the war is necessary and prices will come down is convenient because it avoids examining who is actually profiting and why.
The truth is bigger than either argument.
The war is the accelerant. It is not the cause.
The cause is structural. The refining industry used COVID as cover to permanently reduce capacity. Every crisis that has come since, Russia-Ukraine in 2022, the Iran war in 2026, hits American consumers harder than it should because the cushion was deliberately removed. The system has less margin for disruption. And every disruption generates larger profits for the companies that made the system more fragile by design.
Then those profits get recycled into political spending. $219 million in the 2024 cycle. $154 million in lobbying in a single year. That money buys silence. It buys inaction. It buys the absence of hearings, the absence of investigations, the absence of regulation. And the cycle repeats.
Close the refineries. Tighten the supply. Wait for the next crisis. Harvest the margins. Post record profits. Spend record amounts on politicians. Protect the arrangement. Let the American consumer absorb the cost.
That is not a free market. That is a captured market. And the capture was paid for with profits extracted from the people now paying $6.05 per gallon to drive to work, feed their families, and heat their homes.
Diesel is the lifeblood of the American economy. It powers every truck that delivers every product to every shelf in every store you walk into. It powers the farm equipment that grows your food. It powers the construction equipment that builds your roads and your buildings. It powers the generators that keep your hospitals running when the grid fails. When diesel goes up, everything goes up. Groceries. Shipping. Heating. Construction. Manufacturing. Every cost that touches transportation, and in America that is nearly every cost, has diesel underneath it.
Fuel accounts for 15% to 30% of the total cost of food, according to the Independent Grocers Alliance. When diesel goes from $3.70 to $6.05 in one year, that is not a minor fluctuation. That is a structural shock to the cost of living for every American family.
And the people who engineered the conditions that make that shock possible are posting $12.6 billion in quarterly profits and spending $219 million to make sure the politicians you elected never ask them a single question about it.
The next time someone tells you diesel is expensive because of Trump, ask them why crude is below its inflation-adjusted highs from 2008 and 1980 but diesel is higher than it has ever been in history. Ask them what happened to the 11 refineries that closed since 2020. Ask them what a crack spread is and why it is running 3 to 5 times its historical average. Ask them how much Marathon, Valero, and Phillips 66 made last quarter. Ask them how much the oil and gas industry spent on the 2024 election.
And the next time someone tells you prices will come down when the war ends, ask them why prices never came back down after the Russia-Ukraine disruption faded in 2023. Ask them why the refining capacity that was removed during COVID was never rebuilt. Ask them why every subsequent crisis hits harder than it should.
The answer to both questions is the same.
The system is working exactly as designed. It is just not designed for you.
It is designed for the companies that post record profits every time a crisis creates scarcity. And for the politicians who take their money and look the other way while you pay for it at the pump, at the grocery store, and at your front door every time a package arrives.
$6.05 per gallon.
$12.6 billion in quarterly profits.
$219 million in political spending.
That is not an accident. That is an arrangement.
And we are paying for all of it.
8x Comments…5x from Anonymous….what a big yap you have. Non stop preaching. How about you take a break ya big wondbag and let other people put some comments in ya big dummy.
So basically he’s saying all hell is going to break loose after the midterms on top of all the chaos he’s already created the last year and a half Americans must be so proud
I am pretty sure your condition may qualify for MAID…it only seems like a mental deficiency. In reality, your brain is eating itself due to inactivity. It is but a matter of time before your organs start shutting down.
“Les
October 8, 2026 at 3:08 pm
“the war cold come in the days”
As more and more media articles get written with AI.”
I believe things I see, not what nobodies post online.
If we hear it, it’s true, if we don’t, it’s a lie.
As of right now, it’s about as honest as Trump claiming he’s got a really big brain.
“Anonymous
October 8, 2026 at 3:18 pm
What prompted the orange dotard to make this statement was a post by the Iranian government that they were going to release voicemails that Trump had left pleading with them to open the Strait of Hormuz so that gas prices would go down for the midterms.
Art of the Deal.”
KKK – you are what is called as functionally illiterate. It is not that you cannot read it is that your lack of experience drives an insecurity that makes you fear your understanding of what you have read, or are expressing.
In your case, it is endemic, to the point of you siding with bull headedness in insisting you respond to words and comments and feelings you cannot even spell let alone understand.
No one in this world is a bigger loser than those that side with terrorists and the ignorant masses because they are incapable of experiencing a soluble thought that wasn’t crafted by someone you hope you agree with.
In short, a parrot has more knowledge of what it speaks than you do.
Just nuke the dirty f *ucking iranians. Nobody in the world would care. Then find the ones that made it over here in Canada and the U.S. and ship them out too.
No Amo!!! Waiting for kid labor to produce more! Hope he gets ‘NO’ votes in the Midterms& Dems control the orange Ape. Another LOST war!!! Looser Trump!!! Ha! Ha!
What prompted the orange dotard to make this statement was a post by the Iranian government that they were going to release voicemails that Trump had left pleading with them to open the Strait of Hormuz so that gas prices would go down for the midterms.
Art of the Deal.
“the war cold come in the days”
As more and more media articles get written with AI.