Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus was not impressed with today’s White House announcement on the “Clinton-Obama Iranian nuclear deal” and a $1.7 billion payment from the U.S. government to Iran over a long outstanding claim dating back to the 1980s.
“Just days after taking U.S. sailors captive and being sanctioned by the United States for illegal ballistic missile tests, Iran cashed in again on the dangerous Clinton-Obama nuclear deal by receiving a $1.7 billion check from the Obama administration,” Priebus said in a statement released following President Obama’s announcement Sunday touting the Iran nuclear agreement and the release of several U.S. prisoners.
“Lining the pockets of the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism is not a strategy that will keep America safe, and Hillary Clinton should immediately condemn this payment,” Priebus said.
Before the president spoke, the State Department announced that Iran will receive $400 million in the trust fund, as well as a roughly $1.3 billion compromise on the interest, which would be used to compensate for a trust fund used by Iran to purchase military equipment from the United States before the two severed diplomatic ties in 1980.
“This deal confirms Hillary Clinton’s approach to foreign policy is dangerously misguided,” Priebus continued, taking a shot at Obama’s former secretary of state and current Democratic presidential candidate.
“While it is a relief to see unjustly held Americans returned home to their families, the Clinton-Obama nuclear agreement gives Iran too much in return for too little,” Priebus said. “Iran will have access to more than $100 billion in unfrozen assets to fuel its increasing aggression and is ultimately never blocked from obtaining a nuclear weapon.”
On Saturday, the United Nations’ nuclear agency announced that Iran had fulfilled the guidelines imposed in the nuclear deal, and lifted economic sanctions The U.S. and its allies released about $100 billion in frozen assets as a result of the U.N. declaration.
“An empowered Iran is not a result worth celebrating, and it’s clear only a Republican president will take the steps necessary to ensure Iran’s dangerous nuclear ambitions are never realized,” Priebus said.
