Sen. Lindsey Graham escalated pressure on Iran Sunday by calling for a lethal military perimeter around the regime’s buried nuclear material, warning that anyone approaching the site should be treated as a target.
The South Carolina Republican made the remarks during an appearance on NBC News’ “Meet The Press,” where he discussed President Trump’s demand that Iran surrender what the administration calls its remaining “nuclear dust” following last summer’s massive U.S. airstrikes on Iranian atomic facilities.
“He wants to get the nuclear dust,” Graham said of Trump.
“There’s another way to do it, and I talked to him about it yesterday.”
“Draw a circle around where we know it’s at. Call it the circle of death. Anybody [who] goes inside the circle is going to die until we can find a way to deal with this.”
Graham argued the strategy would prevent Iran from recovering enriched uranium or rebuilding parts of its nuclear infrastructure.
“The goal is to make sure they can’t retrieve it. They can’t make a dirty bomb. They can’t further enrich,” Graham said. “Their enrichment capability has been obliterated at least for a couple years.”
Lindsey Graham says the U.S. has ‘hit a wall’ on Iran negotiations: Full interview https://t.co/hVQd5UBXDG pic.twitter.com/La8lx6DEe8
— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) May 17, 2026
The comments came just hours before President Trump issued another public warning to Tehran.
“For Iran, the Clock is Ticking, and they better get moving, FAST, or there won’t be anything left of them,” Trump wrote Sunday on Truth Social.
“TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE!”
The administration has repeatedly framed the removal of Iran’s enriched uranium stockpile as a non-negotiable part of any deal to end the now 11-week-old conflict.
Speaking Friday on Fox News’ “Special Report,” Trump claimed Iran had previously agreed to surrender the material before later backing away.
“We really had the confines of a deal,” Trump said. “No nuclear, they were going to give us the dust, nuclear dust, all the — everything we wanted.”
More over at The New York Post:
Sen. Lindsey Graham calls for Trump to create 'circle of death' around Iran's nuclear sites https://t.co/6jFt2YAZBs pic.twitter.com/7I6JPzsmf7
— New York Post (@nypost) May 18, 2026
