Operation Economic Outcast Reaches One-Month Mark: What to Know

The U.S. government continues to expand sanctions targeting Iran and the individuals and entities supporting the regime a month after launching a new economic pressure operation.

Following months of military conflict between the United States and Iran, the Trump administration unveiled Operation Economic Outcast on Aug. 24. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent called it an “economic onslaught” meant to “sever every economic lifeline” until the regime stands alone.

The economic operation came after President Donald Trump ordered the U.S. military to resume a blockade of ships attempting to enter or leave Iranian ports on July 14 following Iran’s attacks on multiple commercial vessels passing through the Strait of Hormuz. As of Sept. 23, U.S. forces had redirected 115 ships to ensure compliance with the blockade.

“Iran now faces a very clear choice, with only two paths before them: complete global isolation and a subsistence economy or a path back to normalcy with an opportunity to rejoin the global economy,” Bessent said last month.

Here are four things to know as the operation hits the one-month mark.

New US Sanctions

Operation Economic Outcast targets both Iran and its network of entities and individuals that enable the regime to evade sanctions, smuggle oil, and fund acts of terror.

Over the past month, the operation has expanded sanctions to include penalties against individuals and entities operating in Iran’s shipping, aviation, technology, gold, and digital asset sectors.

The U.S. government has warned that foreign firms continuing to help Iran evade sanctions or conduct money laundering for the regime will be at risk of being excluded from the U.S. financial system.

“Following President Trump and Secretary Bessent’s launch of Operation Economic Outcast, the Treasury began rolling out action in earnest,” a Treasury spokesperson told The Epoch Times on Sept. 23.

In an emailed statement, the Treasury spokesperson said the administration would continue to work with its partners to “keep the Iranian regime from using any remaining economic lifelines to support its destabilizing and terroristic agenda.”

At the start of the operation, the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned almost 60 entities and individuals for supporting Iran’s nuclear, missile, cyber, and oil networks.

Additional sanctions have included an Egyptian bank branch in the United Arab Emirates; a Turkish bank; a Russian bank; and Bitbank, an Iran-linked digital assets venture.

The Treasury also imposed sanctions against 27 Iranian airline operators and entities and individuals linked to the Iran-aligned terrorist groups Kataib Hezbollah and Lebanese Hezbollah.

Impact of the Sanctions

The Trump administration has described Operation Economic Outcast as an “economic D-Day,” designed to cripple the Iranian economy.

Shortly after the start of the operation, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian told state television that Iranian exports and imports had been reduced by 25 percent and 35 percent.

“Then some people say sanctions have no effect at all,” Pezeshkian said. “I really don’t know what to say to these people.”

The International Monetary Fund estimates that Iran’s consumer price inflation has reached nearly 69 percent.

The value of Iran’s rial has also fallen by over 25 percent following the reinstatement of the U.S. naval blockade and economic pressure, with the U.S. dollar trading at about 2,350,000 rials.

About 20,000 workers have become unemployed in Iran’s Hormozgan province, according to the Workers’ House, a state-affiliated trade union center.

The economic conditions in Iran have resulted in long gas lines and shortages of goods such as pharmaceutical products and vehicle parts.

Earlier this month, Iran doubled the cost of gasoline for Iranians purchasing more than their quota of 29 gallons.

“It’s having an effect. Their economy is in real trouble,” Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.) told The Epoch Times on Sept. 23. “It also affects how much other countries like China help.”

Hoeven noted that the operation “creates a disincentive” for countries like China and India to engage with Iran.

During a speech to the U.N. General Assembly on Sept. 22, Trump called on all nations to join the United States in “enforcing the complete economic isolation” of Tehran.

Tehran’s Response

In response to the new sanctions, Iran has accused the United States of bullying other countries into cutting off economic relations with the regime and vowed that the economic pressure campaign will not work.

During a speech to the U.N. General Assembly on Sept. 23, Pezeshkian suggested that the “resistance of the Iranian people will only increase in the face of sanctions, increased pressure, [and] increased bullying.”

“We will never bow our head or bend at the knee,” he said.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi condemned the sanctions in a letter to the United Nations last month, according to Iran International, a Persian-language news outlet based in London. He said that nations faced a choice between defending the rights of sovereign states or “submitting to the unilateralism and bullying of a rogue state.”

Ongoing Negotiations

Trump confirmed on Sept. 22 that the United States and Iran held indirect talks shortly after he outlined a choice between a peace deal with Iran or the country’s annihilation in a speech to the United Nations.

U.S. special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner had what Trump described as a “very good” three-hour meeting with Iranian officials on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly.

Witkoff and Esmaeil Baghaei, an Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman, both confirmed that indirect discussions had been held through mediators. Witkoff said the United States hoped the discussions would “prove constructive and promising.”

Meanwhile, Baghaei told the Iranian state-run IRNA outlet that the Iranian delegation presented its “views and conditions” to U.S. negotiators “very clearly and explicitly through the mediators.”

Iran’s conditions included removing the U.S. naval blockade of Iranian ports, releasing Iranian assets, and ending the war on all fronts, Baghaei said.

During a meeting on Tuesday with leaders and officials from all the Gulf nations except Iran, Trump said there was a “lot of momentum for them to make a deal.”

Nathan Worcester contributed to this report.