A heart surgeon, a former Tehran mayor and a cleric suspected of involvement in the execution of political prisoners are among six candidates approved by authorities to run in Friday's election to replace Iran's president, who died in a helicopter crash last month.
The candidates have abandoned Iran's hijab requirement, cited U.S. sanctions that have contributed to the country's economic slump and openly criticized the government in a series of debates — a rare move in Iranian politics. Still, voter apathy is high and divisions among Iran's conservative leaders make the election difficult to predict.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has final authority on important national matters, but the president can set domestic policy and influence foreign policy.
The Guardian Council, a body of 12 Iranian jurists and clerics, has whittled down 80 presidential candidates to just six, disqualifying seven women, one former president and a number of other senior government officials. Four candidates are still in the race.
Two of the candidates, Amirhossein Ghazizadeh Hashemi and Alireza Zakhani, have withdrawn from the race to consolidate the conservative vote. If no candidate wins a majority on Friday, a runoff election between the top two winners will be held on July 5.
A pre-election poll on Iranian state television showed reformist candidate Dr. Masoud Pezeshkian leading with about 23 percent of the vote. The conservative vote was split between Mohammed Bagher Ghalibaf and Saeed Jalili, who received about 16 percent each, neither of whom had the 50 percent majority needed to avoid a runoff election.
Here's what you need to know about the four candidates still in the presidential race.
Mohammed Baqer Ghalibaf
Mohammed Bagher Ghalibaf is the current speaker of parliament and former mayor of Tehran, a former pilot and commander in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps who has run unsuccessfully for president multiple times.
He is also known for his involvement in the government's violent crackdown on students in 1999 and 2003, when he served as the country's police chief and reportedly ordered authorities to fire live ammunition at students.
During his time as Tehran's mayor, Ghalibaf faced charges of financial corruption and moral hypocrisy over his family's lavish spending abroad, charges he denies.
The conservative politician, considered a close ally of Khamenei, campaigned on a promise to reduce government inefficiencies and has criticised the government for losing money by failing to effectively enforce oil sanctions.
Mehrzad Boroujerdi, an Iran expert and dean of the School of Letters, Science and Education at the Missouri University of Science and Technology, said Ghalibaf was positioning himself as the only person with the experience and ability to lead and was trying to characterize himself as “the establishment candidate” on the side of the elites in the debates.
Massoud Pezechkian
The only reformist candidate on the ballot, Dr. Masoud Pezeshkian, is a cardiac surgeon and veteran of the Iran-Iraq war who served as a member of parliament and Iran's health minister. After his wife and child died in a car accident, he is raising his other children as a single father and has not remarried. This, and his identity as an Azerbaijani, one of Iran's ethnic minorities, endears him to many voters.
Reformist candidates were largely disqualified in the 2021 presidential and March parliamentary elections. Experts say Dr. Pezeshkian was likely chosen as a candidate to boost voter turnout among reformist party voters and Iranians who boycotted the March parliamentary elections. The government believes a high voter turnout is key to legitimizing the elections.
Dr. Pezeshkian is supported by former President Mohammed Khatami, positions the nuclear issue as an economic issue, and has expressed a positive stance toward nuclear negotiations with Western countries.
Said Djalili
Said Jalili, an ultra-conservative former nuclear negotiator nicknamed a “living martyr” for losing a leg in the Iran-Iraq war, heads the far-right Paidari party and represents the country's most hardline ideological views on domestic and foreign policy.
Jalili said he doesn't think Iran needs to negotiate with the U.S. for economic success. While Jalili is likely the closest candidate to Khamenei, he has given his people a “totally unrealistic” assessment of Iran's economic strength, Boroujerdi said.
“He is firmly opposed not only to the nuclear deal but also to any opening up of the West,” Boroujerdi said.
Mostafa Pourmohammadi
Mostafa Pourmohammadi is the only cleric running in the elections. He is a former counterintelligence chief and member of the committee that oversaw the execution of thousands of political prisoners at Evin Prison in 1988. He has downplayed his role in the executions.
A frank and articulate speaker, he said at the debate that Iran's biggest problem was that the government had lost the support of the people and was unable to motivate them to take part in elections.
Pourmohammadi has criticized Iran for backing Russia amid its ongoing invasion of Ukraine, saying Russia is not reaping enough benefits from supplying arms to the Russian government.
He has also referred to former President Donald J. Trump on the campaign trail. “Just wait and see what happens when Trump comes,” he said in a recent televised debate. “We have to be prepared to negotiate.”
One of Pourmohammadi's campaign posters shows him and Trump looking at each other in the eye and reads: “I am the one who can take on Trump.”