President Trump is expected this week to refuse to recertify that Iran is complying with the 2015 nuclear deal, a milestone diplomatic agreement that prevents Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Mr. Trump seems poised to take that action despite the reality that Iran is not violating the terms of the deal.
- .. In fact, his key national security cabinet officers have publicly said that Iran is meeting its commitments.
- The International Atomic Energy Agency, which is charged with monitoring and verifying the deal, has issued eight reports over the past two years echoing these conclusions.
.. Instead, the president seems prepared to argue that the deal is no longer in the United States’ vital national security interest because of Iran’s other activities in the Middle East
.. rather than take responsibility for deciding the future of the agreement, the president wants to pass the buck. The White House has signaled that after his certification decision, Mr. Trump will urge the Republican-controlled Congress not to reimpose sanctions on Iran that would scuttle the deal. Instead, he hopes Congress will pass new legislation to address concerns that were never part of the nuclear agreement’s original mandate.
.. this decision will breach the trust of America’s partners and isolate our country.
.. If President Trump undermines the nuclear deal, the repercussions for American foreign policy will be disastrous: It will drive a wedge between the United States and Europe, weakening the critical trans-Atlantic relationship and increasing the influence of Iran, Russia and China.
.. when the president travels to China next month seeking support to deal with North Korea’s nuclear program, he will find the Chinese less willing partners. Washington’s credibility will be damaged for the next time we want countries to agree to something, such as
- condemning Iran’s malicious behavior in the Middle East
- or tightening the screws on North Korea.
.. we are likely to lose any possibility of dialogue with North Korea because Pyongyang will assume the United States will not honor its commitments, even on multilateral agreements
.. unjustified unilateral American action will give the Iranians the moral high ground, allowing them to rightly say that it was the United States, not them, who killed the deal. At the same time, if Iran stays in the agreement with the other countries who are party to it, the United States will lose any standing to bring concerns to the Joint Commission
.. The United States, and the world, would lose our eyes and ears on the ground in Iran — the inspectors. This information vacuum could, in short order, lead us to consider military action to destroy Iranian nuclear facilities, perhaps leading to a wider war in the Middle East. Given the escalatory cycle we are in with North Korea, as well as Pyongyang’s and the president’s rhetoric, America will be faced with two countries whose nuclear ambitions threaten our security.
..
Iran and our allies in this agreement know that a congressional election is looming, and a tough stance against Tehran could make for appealing campaign ads. The president and the Republican-controlled Congress are not only playing with fire. They are lighting it themselves.
Trump attacks Corker, who responds by calling the White House ‘adult day care’
President Trump instigated an extraordinary feud Sunday with Sen. Bob Corker, a senior Republican who holds sway over the administration’s foreign and domestic policy agenda, prompting the Tennessean to charge that the White House had devolved into “an adult day care center.”
.. The trash talk not only breaches what had been one of Trump’s few personal relationships on Capitol Hill, but also jeopardizes the president’s legislative priorities. As chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Corker will help determine the future of the Iran nuclear deal, and his support will be critical in passing sweeping tax cuts.
.. Corker tweeted a biting retort: “It’s a shame the White House has become an adult day care center. Someone obviously missed their shift this morning.”
.. Corker told reporters that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly “are those people that help separate our country from chaos.”
.. Trump, who has little tolerance for public criticism and prides himself on counterpunching those who cross him, took to Twitter on Sunday to attack Corker.
.. Womack said Trump has repeatedly offered to support Corker, and as recently as last week asked the senator to change his mind and run for reelection.
“The president called Senator Corker on Monday afternoon and asked him to reconsider his decision not to seek reelection and reaffirmed that he would have endorsed him, as he has said many times,” Womack said in a statement.
.. Corker has been one of Tillerson’s few allies and staunch defenders in Washington, working closely on such issues as toughening sanctions on Russia and engaging North Korea diplomatically — two issues on which Trump has disagreed with Corker.
.. Corker also looks to play a key role in the upcoming debate over taxes. One of the Senate’s most committed deficit hawks and outspoken members on budgetary issues, Corker already has expressed concerns with the Trump administration’s proposal on tax cuts, and his vote will be key to any deal getting done.
.. In recent months, Trump has also gone after Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and Sens. Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.), John McCain (Ariz.) and Jeff Flake (Ariz.) with cutting and sometimes personal insults.
.. Republican lawmakers and operatives have voiced exasperation that Trump is spending his time attacking senators he will need as allies if he hopes to sign any signature legislation.
.. Corker was a prominent supporter of Trump’s 2016 campaign and one of the few Republicans with gravitas willing to embrace the reality television star’s candidacy before he won the GOP nomination.
.. Corker also helped tutor Trump on foreign affairs, and he in turn considered the senator as a possible running mate and secretary of state.
.. In August, Corker criticized Trump’s handling of the deadly white-supremacist rally in Charlottesville, saying, “The president has not yet been able to demonstrate the stability nor some of the competence that he needs to demonstrate in order to be successful.”
.. Corker urged Trump to visit Alabama and campaign alongside Strange in the closing days of the runoff campaign, and the president now partly blames Corker for encouraging him to get involved in a contest that has hurt his political standing
.. thinks Corker feels free to speak his mind now that he is not seeking reelection.
Trump’s ‘Principled Realism’ Is Neither Principled Nor Realist (II)
Trump invoked so-called “principled realism” during his U.N. speech:
We are guided by outcomes, not ideology. We have a policy of principled realism, rooted in shared goals, interests and values.
Trump has shown before that his administration’s “principled realism” is neither principled nor realist, and he did so again earlier this week. Leading realists have been quite vocal in their rejection of the foreign policy he has conducted to date, and they have done so in large part because Trump has been in thrall to the goals of ideologues. Take his antagonism to the nuclear deal with Iran as a prime example.
An administration “guided by outcomes, not ideology” would have no problem with a deal that successfully restricted Iran’s nuclear program. They would have to acknowledge that the deal was working as intended regardless of any reservations they might have about it. It is the ideologue who insists on adding new demands and finding fault with an agreement that everyone else believes to be the best deal available. Trump is inclined to yield to the ideologues in his party because rejecting the deal lines up with his rejection of everything connected with Obama. The consequences of reneging on the deal don’t concern him, just as the benefits of remaining the deal don’t interest him. He wants to vindicate the idea that Obama made a bad deal and that he can do better. It has nothing to do with outcomes and everything to do with proving his predecessor wrong. There is no principle at work here except contempt for compromise and diplomacy. There is no realism anywhere to be found.
Trump Faces Deal-Making Challenges as Congress Returns
“Legislatively, September may be the longest month of the year, with several must pass items that face an uphill climb,” said Doug Heye, a longtime Republican strategist. The president’s decision to push the immigrant program to Congress “only makes that harder, on an issue that for years Republicans have struggled to make any headway on. The question is whether this was a strategic decision by the White House.”
His self-proclaimed deal-making skills could also be put to the test in foreign policy as he decides how to respond to North Korea’s nuclear saber-rattling while separately seeking to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement with Mexico and Canada and broker peace between Israelis and Palestinians. And he may alienate America’s traditional European allies if he tries to scuttle Mr. Obama’s nuclear agreement with Iran by declaring Tehran out of compliance over their objections.
.. As he pressures North Korea to curb its nuclear program, he has belittled South Korea for “appeasement” and threatened to tear up its trade deal with the United States. As he lobbies lawmakers to back his legislative priorities, he has castigated Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, and other Republicans crucial to passage.
.. Mr. Trump’s allies argue that he had a better summer than the Washington conventional wisdom would suggest and that he has a path forward. They contend that after the fights of early August, the president took on the mantle of a national leader with a vigorous and visible response to Hurricane Harvey, and that cleaning up the devastation may prove both a rallying point and a strategic leverage.
.. “It may sound counterintuitive, but the president heads into September with a bit of wind at his back,” said Michael Dubke, who served as his White House communications director. “Harvey was handled well, tax reform is back on track, the debt ceiling showdown will be pushed to a later date and while there are no good choices in North Korea, the president’s national security team is second to none.”
.. It’s not a mistake to disagree when you disagree; it is a mistake to suggest that somehow this president, who was elected just as the Constitution prescribed, and has the responsibility to lead the country, that somehow we need to not work with this president.”
.. On Tuesday afternoon, Mr. Trump will host a group that has been dubbed the Big Six to discuss his tax overhaul —
- Mr. McConnell;
- House Speaker Paul D. Ryan;
- Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin;
- Gary D. Cohn, the president’s national economics adviser;and
- Senator Orrin G. Hatch of Utah and
- Representative Kevin Brady of Texas, the Republican chairmen of the tax-writing committees.
.. Allies said Mr. Trump’s approach to negotiations, however, is to hold out for the best deal possible until the last moment, so it is too soon to judge.
.. “My style of deal-making is quite simple and straightforward,” he once wrote. “I aim very high, and then I just keep pushing and pushing and pushing to get what I’m after. Sometimes I settle for less than I sought, but in most cases I still end up with what I want.”
.. But those who have studied his career in real estate and business said that it has been marked by as many failed deals as successful ones.
- He bought an airline that failed.
- He bought a football team in a league that collapsed.
- He filed for bankruptcy protection multiple times.
“If you look at his record, there are a lot of deals that didn’t work out,” said Michael D’Antonio, a Trump biographer. “So if you think about the true record of performance, he is very good at promotion and creating the idea that he is a deal maker, but not very good at making actual successful deals.”
.. some Democrats argue that Mr. Trump’s very weakness may yet prove to be a boon. Since legislating entirely with fellow Republicans has yet to yield the results Mr. Trump had hoped, he may have more incentive to work with Democrats on areas where they could find agreement, particularly
- infrastructure and the
- tax code.
Democrats would also like to work on legislation stabilizing the Obama health care markets.