Iranian Hard-Liner Set to Win Presidency Amid Nuclear Talks

With about 90% of the votes counted, the interior ministry said Mr. Raisi had received 17.8 million votes, or about 62% of the ballots cast. The final results were expected later on Saturday.

Mr. Raisi’s main challenger,

Abdolnaser Hemmati,

the only moderate challenger left in the race, received about 8% of the vote, according to the preliminary results.

Mr. Hemmati congratulated Mr. Raisi with his victory on Instagram, saying “I hope your new administration provides causes for pride for the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

The two other candidates in the election also congratulated Mr. Raisi on his victory.

Mr. Raisi would be entering office in an election marred by a large-scale boycott. Millions of Iranians stayed home, partly in protest of moves by the clerical establishment to tip the election in Mr. Raisi’s favor before any ballots were cast. In the weeks before the vote, the country’s election supervisory body had disqualified nearly all nonconservative candidates.

Mr. Raisi will be sworn in as president in early August, assuming the final results certify him as the election winner.

Daunting challenges await Mr. Raisi. Iran is facing growing threats and frequent confrontations with Middle East rivals, and is engaged in tough negotiations with the U.S. over how to revive an international nuclear deal and that would lift some American sanctions that have crushed the Iranian economy.

Mr. Raisi, who heads the country’s judiciary, is a cleric with little political experience but a long career in Iran’s legal system. In that position he has presided over mass arrests of journalists, lawyers and American citizens, and the sentencing to death of several minors.

Although Mr. Raisi’s apparent victory was partly due to a historically low turnout—a sign of the divisions within Iranian society and a reflection of widespread discontent with the lack of real choice in the vote—his win is likely to unify the conservative establishment.

Mr. Raisi is a trusted confidant of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who in recent years picked the cleric to head two key institutions: the judiciary and Astan Quds Razavi, a charity worth billions of dollars central to the Supreme Leader’s business interests.

How Mr. Raisi will approach Western nations, notably the U.S., depends largely on who he appoints to his cabinet. He has in the past criticized departing President

Hassan Rouhani

for pursuing diplomacy, which led to the 2015 international nuclear deal. Although Mr. Raisi has said he supports the nuclear deal, because Mr. Khamenei has endorsed it, he has also said he doesn’t trust the U.S.

In turn, Mr. Raisi has been in the sights of the U.S. Mr. Raisi is the first Iranian president to be sanctioned by the U.S. before he takes office. He was designated in 2019 for being appointed to an official state position by Mr. Khamenei.

The U.S. also accuses Mr. Raisi of being involved in brutal crackdowns on Iranian protesters and of serving on a 1988 commission that condemned thousands of political prisoners to death.

More immediately, Mr. Raisi must address a flagging economy while keeping a check on the Covid-19 pandemic.

Growth in Iran has stuttered in recent years, constrained by U.S. sanctions, while unemployment is high and the local currency has plummeted in value. The economic crisis has pushed more families into poverty. It has driven Iranians to protest in the streets, where they have been met with brutal force by security forces.

Write to Sune Engel Rasmussen at [email protected]