Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s denunciation of former Secretary of State John Kerry’s meetings with Iranian officials is just “theatrics,” a spokesperson for the former Democratic senator said.
“There’s nothing unusual, let alone unseemly or inappropriate, about former diplomats meeting with foreign counterparts,” the statement said. “Secretary Kissinger has done it for decades with Russia and China. What is unseemly and unprecedented is for the podium of the State Department to be hijacked for political theatrics.”
That reply echoed Pompeo’s criticism earlier Friday, when the former Republican lawmaker was asked if he agrees with President Trump’s contention that Kerry’s meetings with Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif violate the law. Pompeo ducked the legal question, but condemned the encounters on other grounds.
“What Secretary Kerry has done is unseemly and unprecedented,” Pompeo told reporters. “He was telling them to wait out this administration. … It’s inconsistent with what foreign policy of the United States is, as directed by this president, and it is beyond inappropriate for him to be engaged in this.”
Kerry has denied “coaching” Iranian officials on how to respond to Trump administration policies. “What I have done is tried to elicit from him what Iran might be willing to do in order to change the dynamic in the Middle East for the better,” Kerry told conservative talk show host Hugh Hewitt.
Those conversations took place before Trump withdrew from the Iran deal, according to the Friday evening statement.
“[I]n a long phone conversation with Secretary Pompeo earlier this year [Kerry] went into great detail about what he had learned about the Iranian’s view,” Kerry’s team said. “No secrets were kept from this administration. Like America’s closest allies, Kerry believes it is important that the commitments Iran made under the nuclear agreement, which took the world years to negotiate, remain effective. He was advocating for what was wholly consistent with U.S. policy at the time.”
