On January 14, 2026, National Public Radio (NPR) published an interview about the Iranian protests with Youseph Yazdi, a professor of biomedical engineering at Johns Hopkins University. Yazdi downplayed the extent of the crackdown, invoked the interests of the Iranian people to advise against U.S. pressure on the regime, and condemned the protesters’ tactics. Neither he nor the interviewer disclosed that Yazdi is the son of the Islamic Republic’s second minister of foreign affairs, Ebrahim Yazdi. Johns Hopkins University receives the largest share of federal grants.
Ebrahim Yazdi was the minister of foreign affairs when the hostage crisis began. Immediately after the occupation started, American Chargé d’Affaires Bruce Laingen went to see Yazdi to protest the assault on the embassy. After the meeting, Yazdi did not allow Laingen to leave the ministry; he became a hostage. The transitional government of Mehdi Bazargan, including Yazdi, resigned a day later but Yazdi continued his political activities, including serving in the parliament. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini eventually disqualified him from running for office, but he remained close to the regime-loyal reformists.
Neither he nor the interviewer disclosed that Yazdi is the son of the Islamic Republic’s second minister of foreign affairs, Ebrahim Yazdi.
During his interview with NPR, Youseph Yazdi said he was in Tehran when the protests began. Despite existing video footage depicting the crackdown’s extent, he said, “They have batons, and they have tear gas launchers, which is their main thing. They have these, you know, CS gas, tear gas canister launchers, and they could fire them hundreds of feet. So, they use those a lot.” He did not speak about firing automatic weaponry into crowds or visiting hospitals to finish off the wounded.
Instead, Yazdi criticized the protesters. “In one of the squares in the city near my mother’s house, a major very beautiful mosque was burned down. The square was trashed, and the government just plays those video clips ad nauseam on the state media,” he said, adding, “There’s a video clip of somebody setting a riot cop on fire, throwing stones. The escalation of violence really plays into their hands.”
Yazdi also implied that the protests were not very large, never mind multiple independent observers concluded they were the largest in Iranian history. He framed the problem around “the government,” as opposed to “the regime,” implying that people object to the current class of the rulers, as opposed to the entirety of the system. “[It] seemed like a government that has run out of steam. I couldn’t find anybody that has anything nice to say about the way things are being run, whether they’re pro-government or anti-government,” he explained.
He then took a jab at the diaspora, and, speaking on behalf of the Iranian people, he advocated for a softer approach toward Iran. “I mean, it’s one thing to sit in the United States and encourage [President Donald] Trump or [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu to drop bombs, you know; encourage sanctions. It’s another thing when you live in that country and you’re going to be the one on the receiving end of the economic troubles or the bombs and you’re going to be the collateral damage.”
Such deceitful rhetoric is frequent among those who parrot the regime’s line in the United States and Europe: Downplay the regime’s atrocities, appear sympathetic to the people, condemn U.S. and Israeli policies, praise human rights, and call for lifting the pressure on the Islamic Republic.
Foreign propaganda ought not to come on the federal government’s dime.
Lainie Rutkow, interim provost at Johns Hopkins University, responded to a query about the incident, citing academic freedom and diversity of thought: “JHU is committed to our obligation to create an environment that fosters a range of perspectives within our academic community, as well as our faculty’s academic freedom to pursue ideas. Both are fundamental to our truth-seeking mission. Academic freedom affords members of our community a broad scope for investigation, analysis, and expression, and the ability for our faculty to express their thoughts and beliefs in their personal capacities.”
This proposition fails on two counts. First, truth-seeking requires a commitment to the truth, which Yazdi lacks. Second, foreign propaganda ought not to come on the federal government’s dime. Yazdi uses the Johns Hopkins affiliation to voice opinions which have nothing to do with his academic work. Instead, he appears to act as a propagandist. In Fiscal Year 2023, Johns Hopkins received $3.32 billion in federal funding, with a lion’s share going into biomedical engineering, where Yazdi teaches.
The Trump administration has successfully used leverage against other universities, forcing them to commit to their truth-seeking mission statements. As it appears the United States is about to enter a war with the Islamic Republic, it should not pay the salary of the son of one of the regime’s former top and unrepentant officials. Rutkow might cite “academic freedom,” but she should consider the damage to Johns Hopkins University’s reputation when it confuses academic freedom with demonstrable mistruths promoted and peddled by Johns Hopkins professors for their own personal political gratification.
