The Trump administration is taking significant steps to target a full range of Iranian military aggression and human rights abuses, functionally reversing the Obama administration’s near-total prioritization of the 2015 nuclear deal, according to discussions conducted by THE WEEKLY STANDARD with sources inside and outside the White House.
The administration this month announced sanctions on seven Iranian and Chinese entities linked to Iran’s ballistic missile program, imposed other penalties on persons linked to the Iran-backed Bashar al-Assad regime, and published a State Department report detailing Iranian human rights violations. Those measures coincide with a Treasury Department review of licenses for the sale of commercial aircraft to Iran. Experts and lawmakers charge that Iran regularly uses civilian aircraft to ferry weapons and troops to Syria .
“We will use everything within our power to put additional sanctions on Iran, Syria and North Korea to protect American lives,” Treasury secretary Steve Mnuchin told lawmakers Wednesday. “Both in the case of Boeing and Airbus, there are licenses that will be required and they are under review.”
House Foreign Affairs Committee chairman Ed Royce said the administration’s willingness to crack down on illicit Iranian activity is a welcome change.
“The Trump administration is right to do what President Obama did not: press Iran for its illicit ballistic missile program, support for terrorism, and human rights violations,” he told TWS.
The administration initiative mirrors a congressional push for additional sanctions, including legislation introduced by Royce that penalizes entities involved in Iranian missile development.
“My committee will soon advance legislation to give the White House additional authorities to shut those involved in Iran’s missile program out of the financial system,” Royce said.
The Senate is also expected to move on an Iran sanctions bill in coming weeks.
“With input from the administration, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is prepared to act soon on bipartisan legislation to further hold Iran accountable,” Tennessee senator Bob Corker, the chairman of the committee, told TWS.
A veteran Iran policy analyst who worked on sanctions with the Trump administration and Congress offered several examples of problematic behavior by Iran that the Obama administration ignored in the interest of preserving the nuclear deal.
“The Obama administration made the nuclear deal the be-all and end-all of United States policy on Iran, and so they ignored or even facilitated all of Iran’s abuses on ballistic missiles, terrorism, human rights, seizing American sailors and hostages, and so on,” said the analyst. “But they knew the American public would never accept that, so they said that in theory we were still allowed to act against Iran, even though their real policy was inaction.”
“The Trump administration is effectively making that real,” the analyst continued. “They’re showing that they’re actually going to evaluate everything Iran does, and actually pursue American interests accordingly.”
Obama administration officials told lawmakers during the 2015 congressional debate over the nuclear deal that the agreement would be followed by a robust policy of pushing back on Iranian non-nuclear activities.
Yet in practice, the administration subsequently resisted Iran-related sanctions legislation. Officials tried to delay or halt the passage of the Iran Sanctions Act (ISA) in December, which serves as part of the framework for the broader Iran sanctions regime. The bill was ultimately renewed without the president’s signature or veto.
The Associated Press also reported that the administration resisted Syria-related sanctions in part out of concerns that they would negatively affect Iran.
The administration’s mid-May crop of non-nuclear penalties came as Trump renewed a technical waiver on some sanctions that the Obama administration suspended under the nuclear deal. One official described the renewal as a “placeholder” while the administration conducted a comprehensive review of its Iran policy. Experts on Iran and nuclear issues critical of the nuclear deal praised the move.
“Mr. Trump needs to take his time developing a comprehensive strategy to roll back and subvert Iranian aggression,” Mark Dubowitz, the CEO of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, and David Albright, the president of the Institute for Science and International Security, wrote in the Wall Street Journal. “The last thing Mr. Trump should do before this policy is finalized is to make drastic and premature decisions that could incite a diplomatic backlash.”
