Susan Rice called a preliminary agreement between the Trump administration and Iran a “flimsy, two-page memorandum of understanding” and said it handed over too much before the hard issues were settled. In a Sunday interview on ABC News’ “This Week” with Jonathan Karl, she said the deal amounted to “so many concessions” and warned it was a “strategic blunder.”
Rice’s criticism lands now because the document is being sold as a step toward restraint while, in her view, it gives up leverage first and asks questions later. She said Iran would be able to sell its oil and oil products unimpeded and then gain access to tens of billions of dollars in frozen assets within 60 days, once the memorandum is implemented.
That is the core of her objection. Under the Obama-era deal, Rice said frozen assets could be spent only on humanitarian needs such as food and medicine. In this case, she said, the money could instead be used to fund terrorist proxies, turning a financial release into a strategic risk for the United States.
The memo itself contains the broad reassurance that the Islamic Republic of Iran reaffirms that it shall not procure or develop nuclear weapons. It also says the United States of America and the Islamic Republic of Iran agreed to resolve the disposition of stockpile enriched material through a mutually agreed mechanism, with the minimum methodology described as down blending on site under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency. But Rice’s complaint is that the most sensitive nuclear issues are still not settled on paper, even as the concessions already appear to be moving forward.
She also criticized provisions involving the Strait of Hormuz and the future unfreezing of Iranian assets. The memorandum says the United States and Gulf partners plan to develop a definitive, mutually agreed plan with at least USD 300 billion for the reconstruction and economic development of the Islamic Republic of Iran, but the text leaves open how unresolved enrichment and stockpile questions will be finalized. Rice, who served as national security adviser when the 2015 nuclear deal was signed, is arguing that the sequence has been reversed: the payoff comes first, the real bargaining later.
That is why her warning matters. In 2015, the Iran nuclear deal required Tehran to stop enriching bomb-grade uranium for 15 years, dismantle two-thirds of its centrifuges, give up 98% of its uranium stockpile and accept monitoring from the United Nations. Rice is not just defending that framework; she is saying the current memorandum risks erasing the discipline that made the earlier deal work at all.
