By now, most Americans are aware of the tremendous pitfalls of the Iran nuclear deal. Having had time to review the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, all recent polls indicate that an overwhelming majority of Americans are now against the deal. In fact, on September 11, the U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly voted down a bill to approve the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action by a vote of 269 to 162.
Despite the fact that our system of governance provides for two separate but equal legislative chambers, the Senate and the House, which must both pass a bill before it becomes the law of the land, the president has decided to simply ignore the House vote, entirely.
In its effort to forge a lasting foreign policy legacy, the Obama administration has not only generated what will most likely come to be regarded as the most perilous and feckless deal in the history of international treaties, but also shredded the very foundations of the U.S. Constitution, and has pushed the term “executive privilege” beyond all reasonable limits. The Republican leadership is also to blame, for failing to use all the available means to block the United States from engaging in this massive mistake. There is a great deal of culpability on both sides of the aisle.
Even before presenting the JCPOA to Congress, the administration displayed unusual contempt for the law of the land by going directly to the Security Council of the United Nations and having it enshrined as international law.
The way that the Senate vote was conducted constitutes an even greater disregard of our constitution. First of all, as we at the Endowment for Middle East Truth (EMET) have argued all along, the framers of the constitution tried to protect the American people precisely from situations like this one. The Constitution requires a two-thirds majority to ratify a treaty in the Senate. The JCPOA cannot be regarded as anything other than a treaty because of its far-reaching security ramifications both for the U.S. and its allies for generations to come.
When, on July 29, Secretary of State John Kerry was asked why the administration did not submit the JCPOA to the Senate for ratification in the form of a treaty, Kerry unabashedly stated, “Because you can’t pass a treaty anymore,” which is precisely why the framers had included that clause.
Initially, the Obama administration wanted to circumvent the constitution entirely and claim that the JCPOA was merely an “executive agreement” that didn’t require any congressional approval. Because many of our legislators argued that it was their constitutional responsibility to weigh in on this treaty, the Corker-Cardin bill, or the Iran Nuclear Review Act of 2015, was introduced. The bill was somewhat of a compromise between the president’s wish to ignore the constitutional requirements implicit in a negotiation of such grave matters, and the legislators’ profound feeling that the way the administration handled this undermines their constitutional obligations.
Nonetheless, Corker-Cardin was hollowed out to require two-thirds of both the Senate and the House to pass a veto-proof resolution of disapproval (not to positively approve of the deal), which turned the original constitutional intent of the framers on its head.
Considering the menacing threat posed by Iran to the region and to the entire world, it is difficult to understand why Senate and House leaders would not make more of the administrations’ flagrant flouting of the constitution. Why were they content with this hollowed-out version of the law? Why didn’t they avidly fight against it?
Corker-Cardin was passed by a vote of 99 to 1, the single vote against it was cast by the courageous Senator Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), who rightly argued that the JCPOA constitutes a treaty. However, reading through the law, which President Barack Obama signed himself, it clearly stipulates that the 60-day review period does not begin until all materials are submitted for review, which, according to the law, includes: “Any additional materials related thereto, including annexes, appendices, codicils, side agreements, implementing materials, documents, and guidance, technical or other understandings, and any related agreements, whether entered into or implemented prior to the agreement or to be entered into or implemented in the future.”
Rep. Pete Roskam (R-Ill.), understood this, and on September 17, stated that “the Corker-Cardin law is clear: The 60-day review period begins after the administration provides Congress with all documents related to the Iran nuclear deal — including side agreements. That never happened. Anyone who believes that today is the deadline to vote on the deal either hasn’t read the law or believes President Obama is above the law. We must hold the president accountable for this abuse of executive authority by taking legal action against the administration.”
On September 9, Congressman Roskam, together with Congressman Mike Pompeo (R-Kan.), valiantly introduced a resolution holding Obama accountable for his failure to comply with the law under Corker-Cardin. This resolution was passed overwhelmingly in the House.
On September 10, Senator Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), Senator Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) and Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) introduced a resolution stating that the congressional review provision of Corker-Cardin does not apply to the JCPOA because the president failed to submit the entire agreement.
There is a courageous movement underway, headed by several members of the House and the Senate, seeking to sue the administration for its failure to provide the texts of these side agreements. These legislators argue that the executive branch has violated the constitution by lifting existing sanctions against Iran, which can only be done legally by a 2/3 majority Senate ratification. They feel that the JCPOA is subordinate to the constitution, which they refer to as “The Supreme Law of the Land,” and not the other way around.
Unfortunately, the Senate leadership under Mitch McConnell allowed the administration to filibuster the vote on Iran. Despite the fact that the president would veto the legislation, it was important that a vote be held that would demonstrate the opposition to the deal by the vast majority of the Senate. If a nuclear bomb or an intensification of terrorism under Iranian backed groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah ensues, the individuals who voted to confirm the JCPOA will have their names on it.
During the August recess, I visited the Senate majority leader’s office, and together with EMET staffers presented them with the nuclear or constitutional option, meaning that the majority party will change the rules to avoid a filibuster. We argued that this was perhaps the most important vote of our generation and that it was essential that the votes be recorded for historic record.
The senator’s staff refused to even consider invoking the nuclear option. We left the office in stunned silence, baffled. Knowing that according to the latest polls, the vast majority of the American people, and certainly of the Republican base, were increasingly against the deal, why wouldn’t the Republican leadership do absolutely everything in its power to prevent it from going through?
Our only conclusion was that to those who have been in Washington for so long, everything has become merely a game of politics. The Iran deal, like Obamacare, was something that Republicans could run against in 2016, rather than running on the larger issue of protecting the American public and our allies from the threat of a nuclear Iran.
As Republican candidate Carly Fiorina said at the CNN debate last week: “It’s because you know what happens if someone’s been in the system their whole life: They don’t know how broken the system is.” Alluding to the governors and senators on the stage, she added that “a fish swims in water; it doesn’t know it’s water. It’s not that politicians are bad people; it’s that they’ve been in the system forever.”
Last weekend, another possible reason emerged as to why the Republican leadership refused to subject the JCPOA to the strict standards laid out in the constitution for a treaty — money. As Andrew McCarthy explained in a piece in the National Review, “The deal’s enthusiasts may be a tiny minority of GOP supporters, but they represent big bucks. Often in Washington, the numbers that matter are measured in dollars, not votes.”
McCarthy, a former New York prosecutor, wrote that Boeing, for example, which gives a great deal of money to both parties (60% to Republicans), stands to reap huge profits when the sanctions on Iran are lifted. Major recipients of Boeing money include the Republican National Committee, the National Republican Congressional Committee ($38,000 each) and the National Republican Senatorial Committee ($33,000). Significant contributions were also made to McConnell ($13,000), Majority Leader John Boehner ($25,000), Senator Lindsey Graham ($39,000), and many others. And that’s apart from the nearly $17 million the company spent in 2014 on lobbyists, 80% of whom have transitioned to the other end of the trough after careers in government.
He also outlined how the Iranian aircraft industry was severely crippled by the sanctions, and that once the sanctions are lifted, Iran is expected to order 100 new aircraft in the coming year, and 400 in the coming decade. The Iranian aircraft industry was the major transporter of weapons to Hezbollah for decades, and most recently to the forces protecting Syrian President Bashar Assad.
For those of us who believed in our system of governance, this is a stunning revelation. America’s leadership, on both sides of the aisle, has been playing a corrupt and dirty game, and our children and grandchildren will pay the price for it.
Reprinted with author’s permission from Israel Hayom
