GOP lawmakers: Cut off funds for Iran talks

Republican Reps. Peter Roskam (Ill.) and Lee Zeldin (N.Y.) are calling on senior House appropriators to choke off funding for U.S. participation in negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program.

“We share the Administration’s hope for a peaceful solution to ending Iran’s quest for nuclear weapons. However, after two negotiation extensions, billions of dollars in sanctions relief, and an emerging deal that would utterly fail to dismantle Iran’s nuclear program, we should abandon these talks until Tehran is prepared to make meaningful concessions that would truly block its path to a bomb,” the pair wrote in a March 25 letter to Reps. Kay Granger (R-Texas) and Nita Lowey (D-N.Y.), the leaders of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on State Department and foreign aid. 

“We therefore respectfully request that you work to include the prohibition on additional funds for U.S. involvement in these ill-conceived negotiations,” Roskam and Zeldin wrote.

The letter comes as talks between Iran and the United States, France, Russia, China, the United Kingdom and Germany — a group known as the P5+1 — are barreling toward a self-imposed March 31 deadline to reach a tentative deal.

The negotiations are set to resume Thursday in Switzerland. Secretary of State John Kerry will lead a team of envoys in the make-or-break talks as negotiators attempt to strike a bargain. 

Obama administration officials have said the emerging agreement could lift some sanctions on Iran if the country reduces its nuclear centrifuges from 10,000 to 6,000 and last for around 10 years.

The letter by Roskam and Zeldin, two co-chairs of the House Republican Israel Caucus, is the latest sign of unease among Capitol Hill lawmakers over the potential deal.

Last week, 367 House lawmakers wrote to President Obama warning that a deal must “foreclose any pathway to a bomb,” before they would support legislation lifting sanctions on Tehran.

Roskam and Zeldin said the negations have “failed to bring us closer to a final agreement that would ensure Iran never acquires a nuclear weapons capability” and charged that Congress has been “left completely in the dark” by the White House.

“At this point, Iran seems more intent on buying time to advance its nuclear program rather than negotiating in good faith,” they wrote. “Congress must act to ensure the negotiations with Iran do not proceed if Tehran continues its pursuit of nuclear weapons with impunity and if no meaningful progress is made.”