and I'm not sure how much they need to do to drive up costs. During Covid the economy has started showing signs that the incentives are wrong and Trump 2 showed you can just buy government favours and tilt the field to your advantage.

Even if they don't say that, it is the obvious thing to do. Elections are coming up in a few months. Already because of midterm elections the democrats were expected to gain seats (this is something you could predict the day after the 2024 elections before Trump took office again). The democrats are not so stupid as to not yell about gasoline prices in their advertisements - this is a big deal to a lot of people. Iran has a lot of power to affect gas prices (something they have long known) and so their best chance to harm Trump is to ensure the democrats win as many seats as possible.

The real question is what happens after the elections. There is a lot happening in Iran and nobody can figure out which factions really are gaining power (we know who is the public voice of power, but not if they have real power)