The Coming Iran Battle in Congress : By Rich Baehr
http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=12999
The Corker-Menendez legislation, or as it is officially known, the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act of 2015, enables congressional review of the impending deal on Iran’s nuclear program. However, it can also be seen as one in a long line of actions by Congress effectively abdicating the legislature’s constitutional authority in foreign policy to the executive. In this case, the Senate has chosen not to consider the Iran agreement as a treaty, which would require approval in that body by a 2/3 vote.
The act calls for both the House of Representatives and the Senate to get a vote on the Iran agreement. If they both disapprove of the agreement, then the president can veto the disapproval, and Congress will then have an opportunity to override the veto with a 2/3 vote in each house of Congress. The agreement has to be submitted to Congress within five days of its signing, and Congress has 60 days to vote on approval, with foreign relations committees meetings to be scheduled within 30 days of the submission of the agreement. While this congressional review process is underway, the president is prohibited from waiving or relaxing sanctions on Iran that are currently in place and operative.
The act, in essence, turns the treaty approval power on its head — instead of the president needing 2/3 approval for a treaty in the Senate, now he only needs the support of ⅓ of the members plus one in either house of Congress to have his executive action become operative. The numbers work as follows: A treaty requires 67 votes in the Senate for approval. The Corker-Menendez bill enables Congress to disapprove of the agreement, effectively requiring 218 votes in the House (a simple majority) and 60 votes to end a filibuster in the Senate, which can then disapprove by a simple majority vote. The votes are there to get to 218 in the House with Republicans holding 247 seats, and given how one-sided the deal has become (more so with every new revelation about concessions from our side to Iran). There is a pretty good shot at getting to 60 on a vote for cloture in the Senate, which would require the votes of six Democrats to shut off debate, assuming all 54 Senate Republicans vote to do so. However, a vote to disapprove in both houses of Congress will certainly produce a veto by President Barack Obama, who, along with his secretary of state, John Kerry, has been more obsessively committed to securing a deal with Iran, than has been their commitment to any other action, either foreign or domestic the last six and a half years. One might say the mullahs have become Obama’s BFFs. Whether it is Iraq, Syria, or the nuclear talks, Obama will do what the Iranians ask, and then try to sell it to our “allies” in the P5+1, and in the United States.
After a veto by the president, the numbers become more difficult for opponents. Opponents of the agreement will need to get to 67 votes in the Senate and 290 in the House, in each case 2/3 of members, to override the veto. In the Senate, this means 13 Democrats would have to join 54 Republicans (assuming they all vote to override the veto), or over one quarter of the Democratic members. In the House, the opponents would need to add at least 43 Democrats to the 247 Republicans (assuming they all vote to override the veto) or a bit less than one fourth.
It is likely that the biggest obstacle that will be faced by opponents of the agreement will be in the House and not the Senate. Just before the Corker-Menendez bill was passed, the White House ended its opposition to it, which made the bill easier to pass, but also signaled that the administration was confident it could beat back opponents of the bill when the votes on the deal came before Congress. Supporters of the White House, better described as Obama loyalists who will follow his lead on pretty much everything, provided a signal of their own strength just as the Corker-Menendez legislation was passed. A letter sent around by Illinois Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky, one of the most left-wing members of the House and an ardent supporter of J Street, contained signatures of 146 Democratic voting members of the House applauding the administration’s preliminary agreement with Iran and endorsing diplomacy going forward (meaning no new sanctions, no military action, and of course, whatever concessions the White House feels are necessary to bring a final deal home).
The 146 number for signatures on the letter is significant. If 146 Democrats in the House in the end refused to vote to override a presidential veto of a rejection of the deal by the House and Senate, then opponents would be left short of the 2/3 vote of House members they need. There are 188 Democrats in the House, and this would leave 42 Democrats in the House who could vote to override a veto, which combined with 247 Republicans, would get opponents to 289, one vote short of the 290, or 2/3 level needed for an override. It is highly likely that the Schakowsky letter was designed to signal that the group in Congress that always has Obama’s back will do so again — Israel and our other former allies in the region be damned.
Of course, this is not to say that the 42 Democrats who did not sign can all be counted on to be certain votes for a veto override of a president of their own party. Most of the votes by these Democrats will need to be secured by lobbying efforts (which the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, among others, now seems to be preparing to do). A review of the 146 names on the Schakowsky letter suggests a few of them could be picked off by opponents, especially those who are vulnerable in the 2016 election cycle, or are located in districts that are not dominated by Democrats. But most are either minority group members, and very loyal to the president, or from far-left districts where there is no real pressure from constituents to fight the president on the Iran deal. In many cases among Democrats in these districts, there is a fair amount of hostility to Israel and its supporters.
Unlike House members, who run every two years, mostly in one-sided contests, senators run statewide, every six years, and a higher percentage of Senate races are competitive each cycle than House races. As a result, financing for these races is critical — even a race in a thinly populated state like North Dakota or Alaska, can cost upwards of $10 million per candidate. Historically, Jewish Democrats have provided a significant level of financial support for their party’s candidates in these races, even in states where there is a very small Jewish population. In addition, support for Israel is still strong across most of the country according to public opinion polls, particularly among evangelicals. There is much skepticism nationally about the Obama administration’s apparent policy of off-loading Israel to curry favor with Iran and conclude a nuclear deal with them. As a result, there is probably more leverage on senators than House members on close, controversial votes concerning Israel, such as the votes that will be taken which follow the Corker-Menendez process.
If the Senate votes first, and the White House thinks it has enough votes to block an override in the House, it is likely that a good sized group of Democrats will support the override in the Senate, which will be allowed to vote first. This, in essence, will be Washington, D.C. cynicism writ large as votes to override the veto will be perceived and recorded as pro-Israel votes, even though they will not influence the final outcome. But they will enable some Democrats to campaign as pro-Israel candidates in future races, and preserve the mythology that support for Israel at this point in Congress is truly bipartisan. The real test for senators is if the House votes first and overrides the president’s veto. Then will 13 Democrats surface to get to 67 in the Senate? That is an open question.
At this point, the safest bet is that one but not both houses of Congress might support an override, more likely the Senate. Groups like AIPAC and others will get enough members in both houses of Congress to vote against the deal so it can be vetoed by Obama. That initial vote can also be recorded as a pro-Israel vote, again helping members in their future fundraising and campaign efforts.
Given the lay of the land in American politics, if the Iran deal goes down, the most likely reason is that Iran chooses not to make a deal. But since we have already given up everything that matters to them-the timing of sanctions relief, the release of frozen funds, closing off their scientists and military sites from inspections, allowing them to avoid coming clean on their prior nuclear activities, retaining all existing nuclear facilities and centrifuges, many of which will still be spinning, retaining all existing nuclear fuel within their country, the deal at this point looks like the worst giveaway in recent major power history. And what does our side get? According to one nuclear analyst, Iran’s breakout time to a bomb gets extended by one month, from two to three. And if Iran violates the agreement, what then? Will Obama provide the documentation to Congress when he receives evidence of violations, or hide it as the State Department has held onto evidence of existing Iranian violations to the agreements supposedly already made? Will some American sanctions really just snap back, and if they do, will Iran care, once it has already has pocketed more than $100 billion, and been relieved of many other international sanctions? Will Obama shift to a (hold your laughter) military strategy?
Would Iran really walk away from such a favorable deal, even one with the Great Satan? Since it probably won’t, then Democrats in Congress need to step up, and not just for a charade of recordable pro-Israel votes that still lead to a failure to stop the agreement.
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