Trump Accused Of Gutting State Department, Leaving Iran Crisis In Hands Of 'Real Estate Developer' Jared Kushner

Jared Kushner, a Manhattan real estate developer with no diplomatic credentials, emerged as the United States's lead nuclear negotiator with Iran at a moment when the Trump administration had already stripped its own State Department of more than 1,300 professional staff.

The arrangement, which drew immediate criticism from members of both parties, placed Kushner and fellow real estate developer Steve Witkoff at the table for talks that would determine the course of a potential armed conflict. Critics pointed to Kushner's undisclosed fundraising from several of the same Gulf governments with a direct financial stake in the outcome of any Iran deal.

A formal congressional investigation was launched on 19 March 2026 by Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden and House Oversight Committee Ranking Member Robert Garcia, demanding records of every foreign government meeting Kushner had attended since 20 January 2025.

How the State Department Lost Over 1,300 Staff Before Iran Talks Began

The institutional hollowing-out of American diplomacy predated the Iran crisis by months. In July 2025, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the termination of more than 1,350 State Department employees, including 1,107 civil servants and 246 foreign service officers based in the United States, as part of what the administration described as a departmental reorganisation.

The layoffs came three days after the Supreme Court lifted a lower-court block on the Trump administration's plan to eliminate entire government positions. Emotional scenes were recorded at State Department headquarters in Washington as colleagues clapped out departing staff.

By December 2025, the administration had moved further, recalling nearly 30 career diplomats from ambassadorial posts across at least 29 countries, spanning Africa, Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and the Western Hemisphere.

AFSA Raises Concern on 'Sudden' Job Retrenchments

The American Foreign Service Association (AFSA), the union representing US career diplomats, said its members received no written explanation, only phone calls instructing them to vacate their posts by 15 or 16 January.

'This method is highly irregular,' an AFSA spokesperson told ABC News. The association stated the recalls represented 'a steady erosion of norms, transparency, and professional independence in the Foreign Service' and characterised the pattern as 'institutional sabotage.'

Retired diplomat and former AFSA president Eric Rubin said the scale of what was happening had no modern precedent. 'This has never happened in the 101-year history of the US Foreign Service,' Rubin said in a statement published by CNN.

He warned that the US now faced a situation where more than half of its embassies abroad would be without a confirmed ambassador, calling it 'a serious insult to the countries affected, and a huge gift to China.'

Kushner and Witkoff's Technical Gaps in Geneva Put on Record by Nuclear Experts

Against that backdrop, Jared Kushner and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff were placed at the centre of what became the Trump administration's final diplomatic push before the United States and Israel launched coordinated military strikes on Iran on 28 February 2026.

The first round of US-Iran talks had taken place on 12 April 2025 in Muscat, led by Witkoff and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, with Oman serving as mediator. Kushner formally joined the second round, and both men were present for the critical third round in Geneva on 26 February 2026.

The Arms Control Association, which received recordings and transcripts from participants in two Witkoff news briefings held on 28 February and 3 March 2026, published a detailed analysis concluding that Witkoff 'did not have sufficient technical expertise or diplomatic experience to engage in effective diplomacy.' Its analysts found that his mischaracterisation of Iran's nuclear positions likely informed Trump's conclusion that talks were failing.

The IAEA had publicly documented Iran's fuel stockpile for the Tehran Research Reactor in a May 2025 report, showing 45.5 kilograms of uranium enriched to 20 per cent in fuel assemblies, roughly a seven-to-eight-year supply for a 60-year-old civilian research reactor first built and provided to Iran by the United States in 1967.

A senior Middle East diplomat with direct knowledge of the Geneva talks told MSNBC's investigative team that neither Kushner nor Witkoff brought nuclear technical experts to the negotiations, a departure from standard professional diplomatic practice. Republican Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina went further, publicly questioning why two real estate developers were running diplomacy on three simultaneous crises.

'Kushner and Witkoff are very accomplished businesspeople. I'm sure they're good negotiators, but they're not subject to Senate confirmation, and they're not subject to oversight,' Tillis told ABC News's Jonathan Karl. 'It is suspect that you can negotiate a Ukraine peace, an Iranian situation, a Gaza situation, and whatever, and be the same two people. That doesn't make any sense to me.'

When later asked to defend his credentials, Witkoff said: 'I wouldn't tell you I'm an expert in nuclear, but I've learned quite a bit, and I've studied it and have read quite a bit about it, and I'm competent to sit at the table and discuss it, and Jared [Kushner] is as well.'

Elena Sokova, executive director of the Vienna Centre for Disarmament and Non-Proliferation, called the administration's assessments of the Tehran Research Reactor 'confusing and misleading' and riddled with 'technical errors.'

Kushner's £121 Million Saudi Payday and the Conflict of Interest at the Heart of the Talks

Separate from the question of competence is the question of whose interests Kushner was actually representing. His private equity firm, Affinity Partners, was founded in 2021 immediately after his first government stint ended.

Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF), controlled by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, invested £1.56 billion ($2 billion) in the firm that same year, a decision reportedly made by the Crown Prince personally after his own advisers recommended against it.

By the end of 2025, Affinity's assets under management had grown to approximately £4.8 billion ($6.2 billion), per Bloomberg regulatory filings. Qatar and the UAE were also early investors, with nearly 99 per cent of Affinity's funding drawn from foreign sovereign wealth funds, according to a Democratic staff investigation.

The congressional investigation launched by Wyden and Garcia on 19 March 2026 found that Affinity had already collected approximately £121 million ($157 million) in management fees from its foreign clients, including £67 million ($87 million) directly from the Saudi government.

While Kushner was meeting with Iranian officials in Geneva, The New York Times reported, citing five people with direct knowledge, that Affinity had already begun discussions with Saudi PIF about a fresh capital raise of at least £3.9 billion ($5 billion).

Extended Beyond Finance Issues

The conflict extends beyond finance. According to a Persian Gulf diplomat cited by MSNBC, Witkoff mischaracterised a statement by IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi about Iran's enrichment capabilities, and the claim was 'taken completely out of context.'

Multiple observers, including those present at the talks, told Responsible Statecraft that Witkoff's assertion that Iranian negotiators had boasted about possessing enough uranium for 11 nuclear bombs simply never happened.

Whether the Iran war was a failure of diplomacy, a product of deliberate sabotage, or some combination of both, the record shows that it was negotiated, in the most consequential hours, by two men who built their fortunes in real estate.