Morning Wire - Is The Iran Ceasefire Beginning To Crack? | 4.9.26

Episode Date: April 9, 2026

Iran and the U.S. seem miles apart in negotiations amid the nascent ceasefire, the Trump Administration faces rising political stakes from the war at home, and how long can Americans expect pain at the pump to last? Get the facts first with Morning Wire.- - -Ep. 2724- - -Wake up with new Morning Wire merch: https://bit.ly/4lIubt3- - -Today's Sponsors:Alliance Defending Freedom - Visit https://JoinADF.com/WIRE or text 'WIRE' to 83848 to learn more.Boll & Branch - Get 15% off your first order + free shipping at https://BollAndBranch.com/wire with code wire.- - -Privacy Policy: https://www.dailywire.com/privacymorning wire,morning wire podcast,the morning wire podcast,Georgia Howe,John Bickley,daily wire podcast,podcast,news podcast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The ceasefire deal remains fragile, as both the U.S. and Iran tell very different stories about what exactly was agreed upon. The Iranians originally put forward a 10-point plan that was fundamentally unsurious, unacceptable, and completely discarded. I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire Executive Editor John Bickley. It's Thursday, April 9th, and this is Morning Wire. One attempt to de-escalate is underway in the Middle East. Here in the U.S., the political battle over Iran ramps up. This could be a deal that maybe doesn't produce the types of outcomes, certainly not the ones that were promised by a number of different people in and around the administration. And stocks rally with news of a deal, but will Americans also get relief at the gas pump?

Countries that are more dependent on that oil have probably seen a little bit of higher increase in price than we have here in the United States. Thanks for waking up with Morning Wires. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know. I want to tell you about our friends and Alliance-defending freedom and an incredible victory for free speech. The U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled in favor of Colorado counselor Kaylee Childs, condemning the state's effort to censor viewpoints

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middle of a ceasefire now. Right. It supposedly went into effect in Iran early yesterday morning, but despite that, there have been reports of Iranian strikes across the Middle East in Kuwait, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia says that Iran actually hit a critical pipeline. that the Saudis have used to get crude to the world market around the Hormuz Strait, which Tehran said would stay closed after the ceasefire was announced. Adding to the confusion, White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt said Wednesday that there are signs that the Strait is open or opening. Trump said, of course, that both of those things, the strikes and the Strait, were supposed

to be conditions for the ceasefire to begin. Tehran says that the U.S. side violated the ceasefire with Israel's continued attacks on Iran's proxy Hezbollah in Lebanon, but U.S. officials, have responded that Lebanon is not part of the ceasefire. So it's messy to say the least. Morningwire talked to retired Brigadier General Mark Kymett to sort through some of this confusion, and he said that all of this hostility and chaos is actually part of Iran's strategy. I believe what we're seeing is calculated and deliberate, not random. I think they're just trying to keep everybody understanding that they're still in a pole position in all of this,

and they can do what they want. Now, from what we've seen, there's a massive gap between what each side wants. How does the White House say they're going to reach an agreement when they're starting this far apart? Yeah, from what Iran has released publicly about the negotiations, it would seem like an agreement really isn't possible. Tehran's 10-point plan for peace looked more like a Christmas wish list. It calls for all sanctions on Iran to be lifted, full Iranian control of the Hormuz Strait, continuation of its nuclear program, and more, obviously crossing a lot of Trump's red lines. But according to Levit, the two sides are are not as far apart as it seems.

She says that the original 10-point plan was literally thrown in the garbage by Trump. They put forward a more reasonable and entirely different and condensed plan to the president and his team. President Trump and the team determined the new modified plan was a workable basis on which to negotiate

and to align it with our own 15-point proposal. Levitt said that the first round of talks will be held in Islamabad, Pakistan on Saturday morning local time and Vice President J.D. Vance will lead the U.S. delegation alongside U.S. envoy, Steve Whitkoff, and Jared Kushner. So we have this first round of talks coming up on Saturday. How confident are you or should we be about them being able to come to terms to end of this war? Well, many are skeptical. Kimmitt, for one, did not seem optimistic that a permanent end of the war will come out of this. And he gave us a few reasons for that. First is, like we already mentioned, Iran is not behaving like a good faith operator here and has never done so in his experience with them going back decades.

And then there's China, which, in fact, may be pulling the strings in Iran. And Kimmit warned we should not underestimate the threat posed by Iran, even weakened now, or how quickly it could rebound. I think of nothing else we should have learned over this weekend that they may have been reduced 90% of their military capability, but they're still capable of shooting down American airplanes and when we try to come and rescue our pilots and putting up a pretty tough fight. So they are not defanged. They are still military capable. They are diminished militarily.

But I think it's also important to say they're diminished militarily, but only temporarily. So this really could just be a lull rather than a major step toward ending the war. The White House, though, remains bullish that they can get a lasting deal done. Well, a lot riding on this meeting. Tim, thanks for reporting. Good to be on. You know, sheets don't usually fail all at once. It's never this dramatic moment where they just fall apart.

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Joining us now is Daily Wire Opinion Editor Ben Dominic, host of the Big Ben Show. Ben, good to have you back on. Great to be with you, as always. So we have this very fragile, as Vice President fans put in, situation with Iran. It's complicated, it's messy. And then stateside, things are complicated and messy. So politically speaking, here in the U.S., is this ceasefire so far a win for Trump, a loss, or is it draw. Well, I think it's a win. It's being interpreted as a win, certainly by the markets, which I think

the White House cares about the most right now, as do Capitol Hill Republicans who were getting very scared that this was going to drag on into the summer, that you were going to see people having their summer vacations affected by very high gas prices and the like. I think that this is something that still achieves 90 percent of what the president himself said, did it within the timeframe that he said from the beginning, four to six weeks, and did so in a way that I think can allow the administration to declare victory. We'll see how much that actually lasts, though, in the long term. Right, that 10 percent, the Democrats can make a lot of that. What is the best possible result here for Trump and what's the worst possible result?

Sure. I think the best possible result here is that the destruction of the Iranians' missile program and essentially, you know, cutting off the head of virtually everybody who was in that regime, who has the ability to enrich uranium, who has the knowledge on how to target other countries effectively, to essentially turn their military into a leaderless organization to the extent it still exists, you know, that's the best outcome that I think you could really look at here in terms of turning into something where perhaps the Iranians no longer have the ability to project power in the region in the way that they have in the past. I think the worst case scenario is one where China, which was a major part of brokering this deal, steps in and tries to help the Iranians essentially gain their footing again,

help the regime regain control to the degree that they had it before, and assists them with recovering the uranium that we know is mostly buried now and inaccessible, perhaps. That's all things that are on the table. Those are possibilities. And one last thing that I think we should keep in mind is that the United States expended an enormous amount of military resources. They were so impressive in terms of what they achieved. But there's some backfill here with the U.S. defense situation

that needs to be addressed. If that's not addressed, that could produce significant problems down the road, especially if other conflicts emerge. Now, we've had some mixed polling over the last week, warning signs for both Republicans and Democrats, actually CNN really highlighting the bad news for Democrats. As things stand now with Iran, obviously, as an X factor. Who is projecting better come the midterms in November?

Well, certainly you would have to say that historically Democrats are, you know, in the catbird seat. They already have written off the idea that Republicans have a chance at holding the U.S. House. And they had been hopeful, I think, in the current run-up with the Iran and the gas prices that we were seeing, that they could even nip at the Senate. There were concerns on Capitol Hill among some Republicans about that. Instead, now, I think Republicans actually feel pretty bullish. They feel like if this deal lasts, if this ceasefire lasts, they can go into the summer with lower gas prices. The market's already responding very positively. They can start making the case about the tax refunds that everybody's going to be getting

this month and that they can look at the situation going into November and start highlighting a lot of the radicalism that Democrats have been doing in states like Virginia and New Jersey and certainly in New York City as well as being what this Democratic Party represents, not any kind of hope of occupying a moderate or centrist position. Well, the spin has already begun on this ceasefire. We will see in the next few days which direction both parties go. But I think some of this is pretty predictable, as you've said.

Ben, thank you so much for joining us. Great to be with you. Americans are still feeling the economic effects of the Iran conflict, particularly at the gas station. but how long might that last? Joining us now to discuss is former Trump Economic Advisor and co-founder of Unleash Prosperity, Stephen Moore.

Stephen, thanks for coming on. Thank you for having me. Now, the first big question is, when do we, can we expect gas prices to come down? And what factors are going to be important there? Well, obviously, if the price of oil comes down, then gas prices come down and probably takes a week or two before we start to really feel the relief at the,

pump. The real question is, you know, whether the Iranians stick to the deal. About 25 to 30 percent of the world's oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz. So when that supply chain was blocked, it caused the price of oil to go up from, you know, $70 a barrel to as high as $115 a barrel. Now it's come down to around 90, which is still too high, but it's going to bring the price down, by my estimate, down well below $4 a gallon, and that'll be blessed relief for people. I understand Europe gets most of their gas from the Middle East, but we are mostly independent. Does the global price of oil equalize that for everyone worldwide, or are we going to have better prices than Europe?

Well, this is a very important point. We do get some Canada, Mexico and other countries, but we're a net exporter of oil. So people ask me, well, then why, if we're not dependent on the Middle East oil is the price going up so much here, and it's because oil is the ultimate global commodity. Just like gold is a global commodity. And so when there's a shortage of oil, as there is because of the Middle East disruptions, it causes everyone's gas prices to go up, although countries that are more dependent on that oil have probably seen a little bit of higher increase in price than we have here in the United States. Now, we had a ceasefire announced late Tuesday night.

What have we seen in terms of the economic response to that news? Well, the immediate response was incredibly positive. You know, overnight the stock market went up by a thousand points to the Dow Jones. And so we've seen about a two and a half to three percent gain in 24 hours. That's a pretty amazing number. And we also saw the gas price fall from what had been at, I don't know, roughly 110 and it dropped to 94. That's a pretty big drop in just, you know, a few hours. And it's because the deal was cut where the, at least purportedly, the Iranians agreed to keep the straight of Hermuz open so that those ships can get through.

Well, and of course it's a very fragile truce. And the one thing markets really like is stability. So do you think that it will take a longer-term pattern of stability for markets to really rebound? Yes. Yes. I think that's a very good point. And hopefully the good news continues to trickle in about what has actually been agreed to. and what enforcement levels there will be.

Now, one of the things that concerned me about the little information that we do have so far about what's been agreed to is that the Iranians want to basically be paid a toll for any ship that flows through the Strait of Hormuz. Well, that's ridiculous. I mean, it would just cause incredible disruptions to global commerce, and so we can't live with that, and I certainly hope Trump doesn't agree to it. There has been some discussion about how this, disruption in the Middle East could actually benefit the United States in the long term if it

encourages us to up our production and perhaps incentivizes Europe to buy from us rather than buying from these unstable markets in the Middle East. Do you think that that's a likely long-term outcome from this? The Middle East is still an important supplier of oil globally. So at least in the short term, we're going to continue to be dependent on what happens with the Middle East. And with Saudi Arabia and Qatar and other countries. But I think the takeaway from this latest incidents is we cannot view the Middle East as a reliable source. They're not reliable. Every five or ten years, we have one of these disruptions and it causes global economic havoc. We have to produce as much domestic energy as we can. And let's make North America,

that would be Canada, the United States and Mexico, the number one dominant region in the world for oil and gas, not the Middle East. All right. Well, Stephen, we're just about out of time, but thank you so much for coming on today. Thank you. Thanks for waking up with us and for those listening to the show. You can also now watch the show free on Daily Wire Plus.

We'll be back this evening with more news to know.