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Lawmakers Warn They Will “Act Decisively” If Bad Nuke Deal is Reached With Iran

by TheTower.org Staff |

Lawmakers on Wednesday issued a statement warning the White House that they would aim to increase sanctions on Tehran if the administration fails to agree to what Senators Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) and Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) described as a “good deal” as the deadline to reach an agreement with Iran over its nuclear program draws closer. The senators, who last year coauthored bipartisan legislation that would have locked in sanctions should negotiations fail, laid out the core demand in a press release on Wednesday:

As co-authors of bipartisan sanctions laws that compelled Iran to the negotiating table, we believe that a good deal will dismantle, not just stall, Iran’s illicit nuclear program and prevent Iran from ever becoming a threshold nuclear weapons state.

Earlier this month the State Department had been pressed on congressional support for a deal, with veteran Associated Press reporter Matt Lee declaring that literally no members of Congress – “none of them, even Democrats, even lawmakers from the President’s own party, are supportive of the way” the deal is reportedly shaping up.

On Wednesday, CNN reported Sen. Kirk as saying “Iran will use a weak deal as cover to get nuclear weapons.” Senator Lindsey Graham on Wednesday doubled down on comments he had made the day before at a conference held by the Israeli American Council, tweeting about Congressional action on a potential deal in Vienna:

Mark Dubowitz, the executive director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told reporters on a conference call organized by The Israel Project on Wednesday that Congress could be credited with “designing many of the toughest sanctions that forced Iran to the negotiating table” and suggested that the administration have Congress “play a role in helping to design and oversee a post-agreement sanctions architecture that preserves key sanctions leverage to enforce an agreement while providing a sanctions relief pathway for Iran to secure the deal.”

In recent weeks, observers have expressed concerns that a two-way dynamic appears to be taking shape in which Iranian leverage has increased – the Iranians have continued to enrich and stockpile uranium, providing them with more assets to trade away – even as the international sanctions regime that the U.S. relies on for leverage has eroded.

[Photo: E&O Politics / YouTube]

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