President doesn’t address Iranian seizure of Navy boats in SOTU speech

by Kristina Wong - 01/12/16 10:16 PM ET

President Obama didn’t mention Iran’s seizure of two U.S. Navy vessels and 10 sailors in his State of the Union address.

The White House before Tuesday night’s speech pledged that the president wouldn’t discuss the crisis, and Obama stuck to that plan despite pressure from Republicans and criticism from political pundits on television.

{mosads}He did, however, tout the Iranian nuclear deal that his administration led negotiations on.

“As we speak, Iran has rolled back its nuclear program, shipped out its uranium stockpile, and the world has avoided another war,” the president said.

After two Navy riverine craft and the sailors onboard — nine men and one woman — were seized by the Iranian military in the Persian Gulf on Tuesday, the question of whether Obama would address the incident loomed over his speech.

Some Republicans issued statements urging the president to address the incident, which highlighted continuing tensions with Iran despite the nuclear agreement.

Others predicted he would not mention the incident at all.

“I’m sure @POTUS will mention his new ‘partner’ #Iran tonight. Somehow I doubt this latest incident makes it into his #LastSOTU speech,” tweeted Rep. Peter Roskam (R-Ill.), a member of the House Ways and Means committee.

Surprisingly, the president did not speak at length about the nuclear deal with Iran that he was expected to tout as a foreign policy achievement.

Instead, he put the deal into the context of his overall foreign policy approach, which he called “patient and disciplined.”

“That’s why we built a global coalition, with sanctions and principled diplomacy, to prevent a nuclear-armed Iran,” he said.

White House communications director Jen Psaki had previewed the president’s speech earlier Tuesday, saying that “there are no plans to address this issue.

“This is an issue, like many others, that as president of the United States and commander in chief of the county, we address things that come up every single day, and he is certainly working today, even thought the State of the Union is tonight,” she said.

“So he’s tracking this closely, following this closely, but the State of the Union … will not be about this issue,” she said.

Tags Barack Obama Iran State of the Union