Ok, finally got to read all the details in this @SangerNYT story. Apart from the many...oddities that others have pointed out, here's another: why would Iran come back to the table before the election? 1/ https://twitter.com/SangerNYT/status/1254532939964088331

See this line: "The entire drama could play out this autumn in the weeks before the presidential election, setting up a potential confrontation with Iran in the midst of the contest." 2/

Also: "the administration’s larger plan may...[be] to force Tehran to give up any pretense of preserving the [JCPOA]. Only by shattering it, many senior administration officials say, will [Iran] be forced to negotiate an entirely new agreement more to Mr. Trump’s liking." 3/

But as @KSchultz3580 has argued, polarization (and Trump's own behavior) has made credible commitments much harder for the US. Why would Iran let itself be an October surprise? Why would they negotiate months/weeks before knowing who wins the election? https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0163660X.2017.1406705 4/

Yeah, they wouldn't. Almost as if the real goal is...something else. Paging Downes and O'Rourke in @monkeycageblog https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/07/31/some-in-d-c-want-regime-change-in-iran-good-luck-with-that/ 5/

And just in case a new deal in October(ish) is actually the goal, see @Nick_L_Miller in @monkeycageblog on why that's so...unlikely. 6/END https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/01/15/trump-is-still-pushing-new-nuclear-deal-with-iran-how-likely-is-that/

PS -- assuming there are political calculations here, this is all to say nothing of whether voters would care about an Iran crisis if the election is all about COVID, etc.