U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance speaks to members of the media before boarding the Second Air Force after the U.S. and Iran held high-level talks at the Lake Lucerne Summit at Emmen Military Air Base in Emmen, Switzerland, June 22, 2026.
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U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance said economic pressure is the United States’ “most effective tool” against Iran.
Vance said on his podcast that the move was a “delicate dance” as both sides put pressure on each other, but added: “The truth of the last few weeks is they were feeling a lot more pressure than we were.”
His comments came after US President Donald Trump said the US would launch what he called “the most devastating economic operation ever waged against any country” against Iran. President Trump also threatened to impose harsh economic sanctions on countries that helped Iran evade sanctions, adding: “This will be an economic war and isolation of unprecedented proportions.”
In his remarks, Vance argued that while pump prices for Americans remain high, prices have come down “significantly” because the United States, with military support, has succeeded in extracting “significant amounts of oil and gas” from the Strait of Hormuz.
However, recently observed ship traffic through Hormuz remained low, with 10 voyages on Monday and two passages on Sunday, according to data provided by trade information firm Kpler.
Before the war, the average number of ships passing through the Strait was about 130 per day.
Iran’s main leverage is access to the strait, Vance said, adding, “Hopefully, we can’t even get it back to what it was before, but we can get enough oil and gas out so that some Americans can have some relief at the pump and some relief in energy prices.”
Vance said Iran has been punished for firing on commercial ships, and the United States intends to prevent Iranian forces from doing so.
“I think we’ve been pretty successful,” he claimed. His words echoed Trump’s Truth social post, which said Iran was already “in crisis.”
“Do they want to suffocate their economy for the rest of their lives, or do they want to build better relationships with the West? That’s the choice the president has given them,” Vance said.
—CNBC’s Anniek Bao and Chloe Taylor contributed to this report.
