How Congress Could Derail a Nuclear Deal With Iran

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  • How Congress Could Derail a Nuclear Deal With Iran - Businessweek
    http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-11-25/how-congress-could-derail-a-nuclear-deal-with-iran

    Removing sanctions that have been passed into law by Congress, however, is a much more difficult challenge. Despite the partisan gridlock in Washington over the past several years, bipartisan majorities have managed to cooperate on three separate rounds of sanctions since 2010, including measures targeting Iran’s central bank, which Iran will undoubtedly want rescinded. Removing those laws from the books will force the White House to go through Congress all over again. That will require overcoming the partisanship and procedural hurdles that have consumed Congress in recent years.

    More challenging still, it will require confronting the many members of Congress who harbor goals for the nuclear negotiations that diverge sharply from the goals of the White House. Although last week’s interim agreement essentially concedes that Iran will maintain an enrichment program in any future compromise, many members of Congress have declared that Iran cannot be trusted with any nuclear capabilities at all.

    Senator Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), who co-sponsored the most recent round of sanctions to pass Congress, has been particularly blunt. “How do you define an Iranian moderate?” he said recently. “That’s an Iranian who’s out of bullets and money.” In responding to the Geneva deal, Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) declared: “There is now an even more urgent need for Congress to increase sanctions until Iran completely abandons its enrichment and reprocessing capabilities.”