With the withdrawal of other candidates, Friday's election has turned into what is seen as an unexpectedly tight race between incumbent President Hassan Rouhani, of the Reformist bloc, and Ebrahim Raisi, a Principlist cleric and jurist. The pragmatist Rouhani won 21.6 million votes in Friday’s hard-fought contest, compared to 14 million for Raisi, with 37 million votes counted, the source said, adding about four million more votes were still to be tallied. Senior official leaves Khamenei office to join Rouhani campaign

Veteran Iranian politician, Ali Akbar Nategh-Nouri has resigned from his post in Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s office to join President Hassan Rouhani’s election campaign. Clearly it’s going to be difficult to back down on some of this stuff.”

The Guards could also use their role as shock troops of Iran’s interventions across the Middle East to try to derail future rapprochement with the West, said Meir Javedanfar, an Iranian-born lecturer at Israel’s Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya. “I respect the outcome of the vote of the people and the result will be respected by me and all the people,” Raisi said after voting, according to the semi-official Fars news agency.
Incumbent President Hassan Rouhani has a lead, citing an early official tally, and is on course to defeat his rival Ebrahim Raisi.