Good morning, I'm Taylor Wilson, and this is five things you need to know Tuesday the 19th

of September 2023.

Today, Americans have been released from Iran after a prisoner swap deal.

Plus, Ukraine keeps shaking up its defense leadership amid corruption scandals, and Hunter

Biden is suing the IRS.

Five Americans imprisoned in Iran were released yesterday as part of a prisoner exchange

negotiated by the Biden administration.

Three of the American prisoners, all dual U.S. Iran citizens, are Siamek Namazi,

Ahmad Sharqi, and Murad Tabbaz, while the identities of the two other Americans were

not immediately released.

I spoke with USA Today Domestic Security Correspondent Josh Meyer for more on their release,

and what this moment means for U.S. Iran relations going forward.

Josh, welcome back to five things.

Thanks, Taylor.

How smoothly did this exchange go, and how did it come to be?

Yesterday morning at Predon, the five Americans and two of their family members left Iran on

a flight to Qatar, and then they were on their way to the United States.

That part of this didn't take very long at all, but it was two years at least in the making

in terms of negotiations, deliberations, discussions, summit meetings, and so forth between

the Biden administration and Iranian officials.

Basically, the Biden administration, since they first got into office, I think, or maybe a little

after, started negotiating for the release of these five Americans, who they say were wrongly

...