Trump faces a Catch-22 on Iran because of midterms, says his former commerce secretary: Face inflation furor, or withdraw and look weak

The U.S.-Iran war is not going fantastically well for either side. President Trump has been unable to conduct the negotiations he had hoped for and reach a final deal over the Strait of Hormuz. And Iran’s military infrastructure—and a great deal of its economic infrastructure—have been reduced to rubble.Looming over the conflict is a timeline both sides are aware of: The midterms.For Trump, that means the Middle East conflict needs to reach a palatable point for voters before November. For Iran, it means making life difficult for the Oval Office and waiting out the president in the hopes he will lose some of his political firepower.

That’s the current state of play according to Wilbur Ross, Trump’s former commerce secretary in his first administration. Speaking exclusively to Fortune, Ross said the president has a balance of risks to strike: Either face the wrath of voters if oil prices remain high due to the Iran conflict, or withdraw from the region and risk that being used against him.

Of course, there will be other forces shaping voters’ perceptions in the run-up to the midterms—Ross highlights immigration issues as chief among them—but there is no denying that “affordability” has become a political lightning rod, and was the issue that Trump made key promises on during his election run.

Ross underlined that, in the grand scheme of wars, the Iran conflict is thus-far relatively short-lived. However, it has dragged on in the eyes of Wall Street and........

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