REPORT: Trump questions Reza Pahlavi’s ability to garner support in Iran.

President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that Iranian opposition figure Reza Pahlavi “seems very nice” but expressed uncertainty over whether Pahlavi would be able to muster support within Iran to eventually take over.

In an exclusive Reuters interview in the Oval Office, Trump said there is a chance Iran’s clerical government could collapse, blamed Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy for the stalemate in negotiations with Russia over the war in Ukraine, and dismissed Republican criticism of a Justice Department probe of Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell.

Trump has repeatedly threatened to intervene in support of protesters in Iran, where thousands of people have been reported killed in a crackdown on the unrest against clerical rule. But he was reluctant on Wednesday to lend his full support to Pahlavi, the son of the late shah of Iran, who was ousted from power in 1979.

“He seems very nice, but I don’t know how he’d play within his own country,” Trump said. “And we really aren’t up to that point yet.

“I don’t know whether or not his country would accept his leadership, and certainly if they would, that would be fine with me.”

Trump’s comments went further in questioning Pahlavi’s ability to lead Iran after saying last week that he had no plans to meet with him.

Presumably, Trump is playing his cards very close to the vest when it comes to offering any opinions about what is to come in Iran, especially when talking to Reuters, the home of the “one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter” worldview.

Related: New video from Mark Felton: The Man Who Would Be King — Who is Reza Pahlavi?

Earlier from Felton: The Last Shah — How Iran Changed from Western Ally to Enemy.