Fox News | Emma Bussey | 3/ 25/2026
A bipartisan group of former senior U.S. officials — including former military leaders, diplomats, and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich — has issued a letter backing regime change in Iran and endorsing an opposition roadmap for the country’s future.
The letter, signed by about 30 key individuals calls on Western governments to support Iran’s democratic opposition, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI).
“With the Tehran regime discredited and weakened, not since 1979 have the Iranian people been in such a position of strength to take it back,” the letter states.
“Democracy should never have been stolen from the citizens of Iran in 1953 and again in 1979.
“The West must now back the democratic movement, and support Iran’s long-suffering citizens as they fight to regain their own country. America has a stake in their success, and we reiterate here our unwavering support for the cause of a Free Iran.”
Supporters of the NCRI say the effort reflects growing momentum among Iranians protesting what they describe as “totalitarian rule under the ayatollahs,” and argue the current government is “deceitful and hostile to allied interests.”
The bipartisan group also endorsed the provisional government announced by the NCRI, which is based on Maryam Rajavi’s Ten-point Plan, and is committed to holding free and fair elections within six months of the regime overthrow to elect a constituent assembly which will draft the new republic‘s constitution.
The plan calls for an end to clerical rule, democratic governance, and a new constitution guaranteeing freedoms of speech, religion, and assembly, equality under the law, separation of religion and state, and a non-nuclear Iran.
Among the signatories are Gingrich, former U.S. Ambassador to Morocco Marc Ginsberg, Ret. Gen. James L. Jones, 32nd Commandant of the Marine Corps, and former Rep. Ted Poe.
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The letter backing regime change in Iran and endorsing an opposition roadmap
March 24, 2026
American Statement in Support of a Free Iran
In one of the darkest hours of history, President Franklin Roosevelt announced four freedoms that are the birthright of all people throughout the world: of expression, of worship, from want, and from fear. Anchored in the American Constitution and its Bill of Rights, those four freedoms rallied America and the Allies to victory in World War II.
For the past seven decades, these four freedoms have been denied to the Iranian people. In 1979 the people of Iran brought an end to oppression that had commenced in
1953 when Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and his terrorist secret police, SAVAK, exercised supreme power. Unfortunately, the Iranian quest for democracy, as it had been repeatedly dating back to the constitutional uprising of 1906, was again hijacked, this time by the religious extremists who remain in power to this day.
We honor the brave men and women of the U.S. and allied forces who are carrying out the missions assigned by their chains of command, and we unite in praying for their safety and success. Long before this military operation, we concluded that the clerical dictatorship in Tehran is unremittingly deceitful and hostile to allied interests. We share the sentiments of millions of Iranians who have been protesting and calling for an end to totalitarian rule under the Ayatollahs.
Since 1979, Iranians have not been able to exercise their basic human rights of expression and worship without risking arrest, imprisonment, torture, and death at the hands of the fundamentalist government in Tehran. Morality police, undercover police, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS), and numerous other organizations have spied upon and terrorized the population.
The 2022 arrest and physical beating that resulted in the death of imprisoned Jina Mahsa Amini, who was arrested because of the way she wore her headscarf, exemplifies the extreme brutality of the Iranian government. The January 2026 protests, by the Iranian regime’s own estimates, resulted in over 36,000 citizens killed.
It is more important than ever for the people of Iran to reclaim their heritage and their future, to replace brutal subjugation with a government of their making and leaders of their choosing. A new Constitution must be developed to provide all citizens the four freedoms identified by President Roosevelt. The rule of law should equally apply to all, regardless of ethnicity, religious preference, gender, or any other discriminating factor.
A widely-endorsed starting point for the development of an Iranian Constitution to meet
the challenges of future is the Ten-Point Plan promoted for the past two decades by the President-Elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), Maryam Rajavi.
Within the Ten-Point Plan is the call for ending clerical rule, freedoms found within the
US Constitution’s 1st Amendment, separation of church and state, equal rights and
opportunity for all, checks and balances between the three branches of government, an end to Sharia law which has terrorized Iranian citizens, and an Iran devoid of weapons of mass destruction that will adhere to international norms and pursue good relations with its neighbors.
NCRI and the Ten-Point Plan is the foundation of House Resolution (HR) 166. Now, before the House Committee of Foreign Affairs, HR 166 was introduced by Representative Tom McClintock, and already has 229 co-sponsors. Per its own opening paragraph, HR 166 is dedicated to: Expressing support for the Iranian people’s desires for a democratic, secular, and non-nuclear Republic of Iran, and condemning the Iranian regime’s terrorism, regional proxy war, internal suppression, and for other purposes.
Singularly focused on Iran’s future once hostilities have ended, the NCRI on February 28 announced the formation of a Provisional Government for the transfer of sovereignty to the people of Iran and the establishment of a democratic republic based on the Ten-Point Plan.
Throughout Iran, resistance units of the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MeK) – a component of NCRI – have already begun challenging forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran. MeK, like the NCRI, is not a new organization. It has been opposing the rule of religious extremists, and before that the corrupt, brutal rule of the Shah, for decades.
While suffering losses in the tens of thousands, MeK has never lost focus of its objective for a free Iran with legitimacy determined by the ballot box. Meanwhile, both NCRI and MeK have suffered unjustly from massive disinformation and demonization generated primarily by the Islamic Regime and embraced by Western governments exercising appeasement while seeking “peace in our time.”
Democracy should never have been stolen from the citizens of Iran in 1953 and again in
- 1979. With the Tehran regime discredited and weakened, not since 1979 have the Iranian people been in such a position of strength to take it ba The West must now back the democratic movement, and support Iran’s long-suffering citizens as they fight to regain their own country. America has a stake in their success, and we reiterate here our unwavering support to the cause of a Free Iran.
Signatories:
