A group of 50 members of the House, made up of mostly Democrats, expressed their concern to President Joe Biden about reports regarding a possible new nuclear agreement with Iran.
The 34 Democrats and 16 Republicans wrote a letter explaining their concerns to the president on Thursday.
“We are deeply concerned about multiple provisions that reportedly may be contained in the final language of any agreement with the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism,” they wrote, urging the administration to consult with Congress prior to an agreement being reached.
IRAN SOFTENS DEMAND ON MAJOR NUCLEAR DEAL STUMBLING BLOCK, US OFFICIAL SAYS
Biden has made reentering the nuclear agreement a signature part of his foreign policy platform, arguing that President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the 2015 deal allowed Iran’s nuclear program to grow. After more than 16 months of negotiations, National Security Council Strategic Communications Coordinator John Kirby told reporters last week that Iran’s decision to abandon several sticking points had allowed for progress.
Iran has made some concessions “that allowed us to get to where we are in the process … so that’s a positive step forward,” Kirby said, noting that the sides are “closer now than we were even just a couple of weeks ago.”
“We’re not there yet,” Kirby added, noting that “a lot of gaps remain.”
The lawmakers specifically mentioned one reported concession — that non-U.S. individuals doing business with Iranians who are not on the U.S. sanctions list will not be exposed to possible sanctions, because those Iranians engage in separate and barred transactions. This scenario was first floated by Politico, which obtained excerpts of a draft of the text, though the U.S. special envoy for the Iran talks, Rob Malley, denied that any such plan was being implemented.
“While we commend you for refusing to remove the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps’ (IRGC) designation as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) — one of our most powerful tools used to compel state sponsors of terror to change — the aforementioned reported provision creates a troubling precedent,” they wrote. “We are concerned that it could significantly dilute the effectiveness of terrorism-related sanctions on the IRGC, Iran’s paramilitary terror arm and provides the organization with a pathway for sanctions evasion.”
They went on to discuss Russia’s supposed involvement in a nuclear agreement and said the administration should not allow Russia to receive “Iran’s enriched uranium or have the right to conduct near work with the Islamic Republic.” The lawmakers also noted Iran’s support of Russia’s war in Ukraine — specifically, Iran provided drones to the Russians earlier this month.
The lawmakers also touched on other recent incidents involving the U.S. and Iran.
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The Justice Department unsealed charges earlier this month accusing Shahram Poursafi of attempting to murder former Trump national security adviser John Bolton, likely in retaliation for the United States’s successful strike killing Quds Force leader Gen. Qassem Soleimani in January 2020. The same week, controversial author Salman Rushdie was stabbed, and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken blamed the Iranian government.
“Amid Iran-sponsored terror plots to assassinate former U.S. officials and Iranian-American dissidents on American soil, this is no time to remove, suspend, or dilute U.S. terrorism sanctions on Iran or the IRGC,” the congress members said. “As Secretary Blinken said in his confirmation hearing, America should do ‘everything possible, including the toughest possible sanctions, to deal with Iranian support for terrorism.'”
