Iran No Confidence Vote Obama is flouting the nuclear review act he signed in May.

Posted By on September 11th, 2015

http://www.wsj.com/articles/iran-no-confidence-vote-1441930197

The Senate held its first showdown vote on the Iranian nuclear deal Thursday, with 58 Senators having declared their opposition, including four Democrats and Republican non-hawks like Susan Collins of Maine and Rand Paul of Kentucky. The American public is also overwhelmingly opposed, with a Pew poll this week finding 21% approval for the agreement versus 49% disapproval.

So it says something about President Obama’s contempt for Congress that he browbeat and threatened 42 Democrats to filibuster the vote so he can duck having to veto a resolution of disapproval. The President may think he can spin 42 Senate votes into political vindication, and we’re sure he’ll get media support for that view. But Americans should read a filibuster as a tacit Democratic admission of no confidence in an agreement they fear voting on.

It’s also an abdication—and a betrayal. In May the Senate voted 98-1 for the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act, better known for sponsors Bob Corker (R., Tenn.) and Ben Cardin (D., Md.), and Mr. Obama signed it. Historically, significant foreign agreements have been submitted to Congress as treaties, requiring two-thirds approval in the Senate.

The Administration knew it could never meet that threshold, devised by the founders so that binding agreements with foreign powers would have broad and enduring public support. Instead, it wanted to make a deal with Iran as an executive agreement, ratified not by Congress but by the U.N.’s Security Council. But only Congress can fully lift the sanctions it imposed on Iran, so Mr. Obama was forced to make his grudging nod to the co-equal branch.

Now Mr. Obama is violating the law he signed, and Democrats are helping him do it. Corker-Cardin stipulates that the Administration must submit to Congress the full nuclear agreement, including any “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.”

The Administration ignored that requirement, allowing the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to reach secret agreements with Iran concerning the inspection protocols of suspected nuclear sites, and then failing to tell Congress about them. Only by chance this summer did Republican Senator Tom Cotton and his House colleague Mike Pompeo learn of the side deals through a conversation with an IAEA official.

The Administration would now like to hide behind the IAEA’s skirts, claiming it never even saw those deals and that all this is standard operating procedure. But IAEA protocols do not relieve the President from meeting his statutory obligations to Congress—or of the embarrassment of discovering, via the Associated Press, that the agency will let Iran inspect its own suspected nuclear site at Parchin.

In a recent Washington Post op-ed, Mr. Pompeo and constitutional litigator David Rivkin argue that Mr. Obama’s failure to submit the full agreement to Congress within the 60-day review period means Mr. Obama “remains unable lawfully to waive or lift statutory Iran-related sanctions.” They urge Congress to vote “to register their view that the president has not complied with his obligations under the act.”

With this lawsuit in mind, the House on Thursday voted along party lines to pass a resolution that Mr. Obama has failed to comply with the Nuclear Agreement Review Act. Republicans believe this vote will help in court if the House or some states decide to sue the President for lack of compliance.

We agree with them on the law, though whether a federal judge would enjoin the Treasury Department from lifting sanctions is far from clear. Our larger concern is that no Democrats joined House Republicans in the vote Thursday, even though many Democrats had previously announced their opposition to the deal. The GOP may muff a chance at a strong bipartisan vote of disapproval, and thus make it easier for other Democrats to duck responsibility for a deal they now own.

Still, the Administration’s bad faith here is a fresh reminder of why nobody in Washington trusts Mr. Obama, who is again proving his disdain for the rules of constitutional government. He is also setting a dangerous precedent. George H.W. Bush risked his presidency in 1991 by seeking support from a Democratic Congress for military action in the first Gulf War. His son did likewise with the Iraq War vote in 2002, and in both cases they got bipartisan backing. What will Democrats say when a future Republican President seeks to take America to war without consulting Congress, or with the support of 41 GOP Senators?

These columns have always favored wide latitude for Presidents of both parties on foreign policy. But a strong executive does not mean a lawless one. Nor is it a recommendation for future Presidents to treat a bipartisan majority in Congress with the disdain shown by this one. Mr. Obama may have the votes he needs to block a vote of overwhelming disapproval, but foreign policy legacies are flimsy when they’re built on parliamentary tricks.

Categorized under: ANTI-SEMITISM.
Tagged with: no tags.

Comments are closed.