Iran Could Buy US Ag Products with Frozen Funds, Trump Admin Says

Progressive Farmer’s Chris Clayton reported that “American farmers could see commodity sales to Iran under the negotiations going on between the U.S., Iran and mediators that just wrapped up in Switzerland.”

“In a press conference Monday in Switzerland, Vice President JD Vance pitched the idea that the Trump administration wants unfrozen Iranian funds to go to buy U.S. agricultural products such as soybeans, wheat and corn. Vance credited Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner for the proposal,” Clayton reported. “…Iran has billions of frozen assets globally, including $6 billion held in Qatar, the Wall Street Journal reported. Qatar could allow Iran to use those funds to buy food and medicine.”

“Vance added, ‘If Iranian assets are ever unfrozen, they are going to make American farmers richer and help feed the Iranian people. That’s a very, very good, and very classic Trump deal,'” Clayton reported.

.@VP says the negotiating team accomplished a “classic Trump deal” in Switzerland.

“Where IF Iranian assets are ever unfrozen, they’re going to go to make American farmers richer, and to feed the Iranian people… that’s great for our people, great for the people of Iran, and… pic.twitter.com/C2KmCPvTob

— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) June 22, 2026

CNBC’s Dan Mangan reported that President Donald Trump on Monday also supported the idea, telling reporters that “Iranian funds that are being unfrozen as part of a memorandum of understanding between the two countries ‘is going to be used to buy food, and the food is going to be bought exclusively through the United States, from our farmers, and corn, soybeans, all of the things they need are going to be bought from our farmers.’ ‘So our farmers are very happy,’ Trump said.”

Additionally, Mangan reported that Tump told reporters that Iran would not use oil sales profits to rebuild its military, but rather “to buy American agricultural products.”

“‘Well, they’re not supposed to be doing that, so we’ll see,’ Trump told CNBC’s Eamon Javers at the White House during an executive order signing event when asked if he could ensure Iran would not use oil money for that purpose,” Mangan reported. “‘But they’re supposed to use money to buy food for their people, because right now their people are very hungry, and they’re buying it exclusively from us: corn, soybeans,’ Trump said.”

However, “Abdolnaser Hemmati, the governor of Iran’s central bank, told the Iranian news agency Tasnim on Monday, ‘There is no obligation to buy agricultural inputs from the U.S.,’ the outlet reported,” according to Mangan. “‘Based on the signed notes, there is no obligation to purchase agricultural inputs from the U.S.,’ Hemmati said, according to Tasnim.”

Past U.S. Ag Sales to Iran Very Low

Clayton reported that “not surprisingly, the U.S. over at least the past quarter-century has sold little in terms of agricultural products to Iran. The height of agricultural trade optimism with Iran would have been 2008 when the U.S. sold nearly $593 million in agricultural commodities to Iran, according to USDA data.”

“In 2018, Iran bought $318 million in U.S. soybeans, which also coincided with the height of the trade war with China that had suppressed soybean prices and exports,” Clayton reported. “Iran really has not made any major agricultural commodity purchases from the U.S. since then, according to USDA data.”