Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has reiterated the requirement that any agreement that his
country signs must include lifting of economic sanctions upon implementation.
Bolstered by an ad hoc coalition of liberal groups that includes MoveOn.org Political Action, Democracy for America and Daily Kos, a couple of congressional heavy-hitters are working to beat back legislation that opponents say could kill a deal to curtail Iran's nuclear program in exchange for lifting economic sanctions. But some powerful Democratic co-sponsors of
S. 615—the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act of 2015 known as the Corker-Menendez bill—are making themselves heard as well. On the Republican side, there is no split:
In moves that appeared coordinated, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) announced her opposition to a bill that would give Congress a vote on the emerging deal. Minutes later, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) urged the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to postpone a planned vote next week.
“Diplomacy has taken us to a framework agreement founded on vigilance and enforcement, and these negotiations must be allowed to proceed unencumbered,” Pelosi said in a statement. “Senator Corker’s legislation undermines these international negotiations and represents an unnecessary hurdle to achieving a strong, final agreement.”
The framework of understanding as the White House has summarized it would make changes in Iran's nuclear program that cut the "break-out" time for how long it would take for Iranian technicians to build a nuclear bomb from a few months to at least a year. In exchange, economic sanctions imposed by the United States and the United Nations would be lifted. The details of a permanent deal based on the framework are to worked out between now and June 30.
As things now stand, the president can lift most sanctions via the Treasury Department. The proposed legislation—with eight Democrats and an independent among the 21 co-sponsors—would give Congress the authority to conduct a 60-day review of any permanent agreement on Iran's nuclear program, bar lifting of sanctions during that period and approve or reject the deal. President Obama has vowed to veto the legislation if it passes the Senate and the House, where it has not yet been introduced.
Although the agreement is a multilateral affair among the U.S., the four other permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, Germany and Iran, if the Senate and House can gather enough votes to override a veto, it would deep-six any agreement, since Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has made clear once again that lifting sanctions as soon as Iran meets its obligations under the deal is key to getting Tehran to sign it.
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The bill is slated for mark-up in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Monday with a committee vote Tuesday. Republican Sen. Bob Corker, chairman of the committee, has said he is close to getting the 67 votes needed for a veto-proof bill. If all the co-sponsors stick with him, he's already got 63 and probably two others. But even keeping the Democratic co-sponsors on board, much less twisting arms to add others, will likely depend on passing some softening amendments.
One of those co-sponsors, Sen. Tim Kaine, for whom Corker already has made changes to lure him onto the co-sponsor roster, was interviewed by Greg Sargent at The Washington Post's Plum Line Thursday:
PLUM LINE: Are you saying there’s no chance that a vote on Corker-Menendez before the deal is done could have the effect of derailing the process, by, say, empowering Iranian hard-liners to say, “See? Congress won’t allow the president to keep his end of the deal”?
KAINE: There is zero chance that Corker-Menendez passing will harm these negotiations. Iran is very sophisticated. They want out from under Congressional sanctions. They’ve known from the beginning that Congress would be involved in that. The question is, What is the process that Congress will use? The letter from the 47 Republicans is engagement under a free-for-all. It’s much better to have Congressional engagement under a standard that is agreed upon and timely, and I think this is deferential to the administration.
Meanwhile, in Iran, President Hassan Rouhani
reiterated previous statements regarding the permanent agreement:
"We will not sign any deal unless on the very first day of its implementation all economic sanctions against Iran are lifted all at once," Rouhani said at a ceremony to mark National Nuclear Technology Day in Tehran.
U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, a nuclear physicist and negotiator with Iran, estimated it would take six months after a final deal is signed for the sanctions to be lifted. [...]
"The core nuclear provisions must be satisfied ... the provisions that give us our confidence," Moniz said.
On the Right, however, confidence can only be delivered if Iran completely capitulates. That would include ending any enrichment of uranium, completely closing the once-secret underground nuclear facility at Fordow, shutting down the not-yet-online research reactor being built near Arak and making other pledges unrelated to Iran's nuclear program.
Even that is unlikely to convince the list of people with clout who have called for war with Iran.