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Politics: 2024 Presidential Election - Background

On 19 May 2024 a helicopter carrying Ebrahim Raisi, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian and their companions made a "hard landing" in northwestern Iran. Rescue teams arrived at the scene, but the search operation was complicated by tough weather conditions, namely thick fog. The search for the survivors continued all night long. On 20 May 2024, Iranian Vice President Mohsen Mansouri confirmed confirmed Raisi and his delegation were dead. Iran's President Ebrahim Raisi was a skilled orator, often criticizing the West and emphasizing the importance of developing the BRICS and SCO platforms.

As stipulated by Article 131 of the Iranian Constitution, First Vice President Mohammad Mokhber would temporarily assume the duties of the president for 50 days, until a new presidential election is organized by a special council. This is not the first time Iran has faced the loss of high-ranking officials. In 1981, during the Iran-Iraq war, both the president and prime minister were killed in a terrorist attack. At that time, the government was far weaker, and the country was less stable. Replacing Raisi might be challenging, but it is certainly possible. Iran’s political direction is primarily determined by the Supreme Leader, a role held by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei since 1989. While his official duty is to uphold the spiritual, cultural, and religious traditions of the Islamic Republic, in reality, he is a key political figure who often mediates between the various factions within the country, balancing the interests of the clergy and the IRGC leadership.

The death of the president, while significant, does not equate to the loss of the head of state, and thus Iran’s policies are unlikely to change in the near future. Although the president has influence and status, the final say rests with Khamenei.

Official Iranian media reported that the Islamic Republic would hold presidential elections June 28. State television said: “The date of the elections was approved during a meeting of the heads of the judiciary, the government and parliament,” adding: “According to the initial agreement of the Guardian Council, it was decided to hold the 14th presidential elections on June 28.” The newly elected president will serve a full four-year presidential term rather than the remainder of Raisi’s termi, whose term would have ended in August 2025. The applicants can sign up for candidacy from May 30 to June 3, while the election campaign period is set from June 12 to June 26.

In an astonishing development, even for Iran, a hardline commentator on live state TV called for even stricter control of the elections to ensure that someone exactly like Raisi, who has been the most obedient president to Khamenei so far, is elected. A similar call was made by the editor of hardline daily Kayhan Hossein Shariatmadari, who is appointed to the post by no one other than Khamenei himself. Shariatmadari said in his own complacent way that "People are looking for someone like Raisi and will not vote for anyone whose ideas are different from the former presidency."

The most likely candidate in the reform front was Majid Ansari, a cleric whose career includes serving as a prison warden. Reformist leader Mohammad Khatami has said that there is no point for reformists to take part in the election if they do not have a candidate. That Khatami was not invited to the funeral ceremony led by Khamenei, possibly an early indication that Khamenei did not want to see any reformist around.

The Islamic Republic of Iran is a constitutional, theocratic republic in which Shia Muslim clergy and political leaders vetted by the clergy dominate the key power structures. Government legitimacy is based on the twin pillars of popular sovereignty--albeit restricted--and the rule of the supreme leader of the Islamic Revolution. The current supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was chosen by a directly elected body of religious leaders, the Assembly of Experts, in 1989. Khamenei’s writ dominates the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of government. He directly controls the armed forces and indirectly controls internal security forces, the judiciary, and other key institutions.

The constitution provided citizens the ability to choose the country’s president, as well as members of the Assembly of Experts and parliament, in periodic elections held by secret ballot and based on universal and equal suffrage, but candidates had to be vetted and approved by the Guardian Council. Candidate vetting conducted by unelected bodies, however, abridged this right in all instances. Government constraints on freedom of expression and media, peaceful assembly, association, and the ability freely to seek, receive, and impart information and campaign also limited citizens’ right to freely choose their representatives in elections.

Presidential elections held in 2021 were widely reported to not be fair and free of abuses and irregularities, primarily because of the Guardian Council’s controlling role in the political process, including determining which individuals could run for office and, in certain instances, arbitrarily removing winning candidates. State-controlled media selectively promoted government-preferred candidates. The council barred all reformist candidates from running, as well as the conservative former parliament speaker Ali Larijani, who was widely considered the strongest challenger to Raisi, and former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The Islamic Republic of Iran’s already severe restrictions on human rights worsened in a number of areas during the year 2023. Women continued to face discrimination, including through enhanced means for enforcing the mandatory dress code, which led to acts of civil disobedience. A total of 798 citizens were executed during the year, marking a 37 percent increase from 2022. Some political prisoners, including approximately 22,000 persons detained in connection with the 2022-23 protests, were released from prison in February as part of a general amnesty, although many were forced to sign purported confessions of guilt and commit not to participate in further protests, and many of those released as part of the amnesty were later rearrested. Restrictions on religious freedom intensified during the year, particularly against members of the Baha’i community, who were arrested and sentenced in large numbers.

Significant human rights issues included credible reports of: arbitrary or unlawful killings by the government and its agents; enforced disappearance; torture or other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment by the government or on behalf of its agents; harsh and life-threatening prison conditions; arbitrary arrest or detention; serious problems with the independence of the judiciary; political prisoners or detainees; transnational repression against individuals in another country; arbitrary and unlawful interference with privacy; punishment of family members for alleged offenses by a relative; serious abuses in a conflict, including unlawful recruitment or use of child soldiers and enabling abuses by terrorist groups throughout the region, the Syrian government, Iran-aligned militia groups in Iraq, and Yemeni Houthi militants, all of which were credibly accused of abuses.

There were severe restrictions on freedom of expression, including violence, threats of violence, and unjustified arrests and prosecutions against journalists, censorship, and enforcement of criminal libel and slander laws; serious restrictions on internet freedom; substantial interference with the freedom of peaceful assembly and freedom of association; restrictions of religious freedom; restrictions on freedom of movement and residence within the territory of a state and on the right to leave the country; refoulement of refugees to a country where they would face torture or persecution; inability of citizens to change their government peacefully through free and fair elections; serious and unreasonable restrictions on political participation; serious government corruption; serious government restrictions on or harassment of domestic or international human rights organizations.

There is extensive gender-based violence, including domestic or intimate partner violence, sexual violence, workplace violence, child, early and forced marriage, femicide, and other forms of such violence; instances of forced sterilization; crimes involving violence or threats of violence targeting ethnic groups, including Kurdish and Baloch minorities; crimes, violence, or threats of violence motivated by antisemitism; trafficking in persons; laws criminalizing consensual same-sex sexual conduct between adults, which were enforced; crimes involving violence or threats of violence targeting lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and intersex persons; significant restrictions on workers’ freedom of association; and existence of any of the worst forms of child labor.