(Bloomberg) — A senior House Republican demanded that Congress be given a chance to review any agreement to revive the Iran nuclear deal, as the US prepares its position on what a top European Union official called Iran’s “reasonable response” to the bloc’s latest proposal.
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“Congress must review any agreement that is reached,” Representative Michael McCaul, the top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said in a letter Tuesday to President Joe Biden. “It is completely unreasonable for this administration to think that a review could be favorable without a robust history of engagement with Congress, to include an increased tempo of briefings as negotiations reach their purported end game.”
The letter from McCaul of Texas, who’s in line to head the Foreign Affairs panel if Republicans win control of the the House in November, comes after State Department spokesman Ned Price said Monday that Iran “appears to have dropped some of its non-starter demands,” although other obstacles remain.
The multinational accord reached under President Barack Obama — and abandoned by President Donald Trump — placed limits on Iran’s nuclear program in return for the lifting of related economic sanctions on the Islamic Republic.
McCaul said congressional approval of any effort to revive the 2015 Iran accord would be needed under the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act, which requires the president to send any accord reached with Iran on its nuclear program to Congress for review along with associated materials, including an assessment of the US’s ability to verify Iran’s compliance with the deal.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken told the House Foreign Affairs Committee in April that “we’ll meet whatever requirements” the review act imposes. The law provides mechanisms for Congress to block an agreement — subject to a presidential veto — and to reimpose sanctions if Iran is found to be in violation of its terms.
But some Republicans have expressed concern that the administration might argue that the law wouldn’t apply to a deal reviving the original Iran accord.
Senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey, the Democratic chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has been an outspoken critic of the administration’s approach to negotiations but hasn’t committed to opposing a revived deal, saying earlier this year that he wanted to see its text first.
In June, he issued a statement saying the administration needs to develop “a comprehensive strategy to address Iran and the threats it poses — Iran as it is, not the Iran we might hope for.”
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