Republicans are outraged by the Biden administration’s choice to exchange prisoners with Iran and accuse President Biden of paying a ransom to a state supporter of terrorism around the globe.
On Monday, the administration informed Congress that it had carried out the arrangement, which required issuing a waiver to release $6 billion in frozen oil money to Tehran that the US had previously frozen under sanctions.
According to the deal, Iran will release five Americans who are being held by Tehran in exchange for the government releasing five Iranians who are being held in the US.
On Tuesday, former president Donald Trump attacked Biden in a post on Truth Social.
“Let’s be clear about this now. With Iran, we conducted a hostage TRADE. We provided them with five incredibly difficult, intelligent individuals that they yearned for. 5 persons were also returned to us, but we also handed them 6 BILLION DOLLARS! What percentage of the proceeds receives Crooked Joe Biden? Is anyone aware of how much money $6 billion is?
When he was president, according to Trump, he obtained the release of 58 hostages “for ZERO money.” He claimed the new agreement sets a “TERRIBLE precedent” and advised Republicans to utilize the 25th Amendment to remove Vice President Biden from office because he believed the president to be “INCOMPETENT.”
Secretary of State Antony Blinken granted foreign banks permission last week to enable the movement of $6 billion in blocked Iranian funds from South Korea to Qatar in order to advance the agreement. Iran is permitted by the deal to use the money to pay for food, medicine, and other humanitarian goods that are not prohibited by U.S. economic sanctions.
Republicans claimed that the administration’s agreement would encourage the country’s adversaries to kidnap more Americans.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, tweeted that he was always happy to see Americans freed from captivity. But this deal would encourage rogue governments like Iran to kidnap more Americans. A terrorist state is actually represented by the ayatollah and his minions.
Sen. John Thune, R-South Dakota, tweeted, “The U.S. should be unyielding in its attempts to bring jailed Americans home, yet Iran will now count pallets of ransom cash, putting its officials in a stronger position to develop a nuclear weapon and finance terrorists. The cost of freeing American hostages will also continue to rise.
Biden’s policies, according to Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York, the head of the House Republican Conference, are “emboldening our adversaries while putting Americans’ safety and security at risk.” She claimed that after the details of the agreement were revealed, she demanded answers from the administration with House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, a Republican from Louisiana, and Rep. Michael McCaul, a Republican from Texas, but that their request was “ignored.”
In a tweet, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said that Biden had reached a “secret nuclear agreement with the Iranian regime” that was being “kept from Congress & the American people.”
He said, without offering any details or supporting proof, “The Biden administration must keep this bargain secret because if they exposed it, the law requires them to appear to Congress and defend it, and this capitulation is totally indefensible. In contrast, “until Congress compels them to do otherwise, they will keep lying about their policies.”
Nevertheless, the administration briefed Congress on the deal’s progress and said that additional briefings are already arranged for this week.
Several Republican legislators also criticized the government for disclosing the most recent information on the 22nd anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
The pact “creates a direct incentive for America’s enemies to conduct future hostage-taking,” according to McCaul, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Given that Iran is actively hosting the leader of Al Qaeda, it is particularly outrageous that this occurs during the same week as the anniversaries of 9/11 and Mahsa Amini’s murder by Iran’s purported “morality police.” The government is exhibiting weakness, which puts Americans and anyone who values freedom around the world in even more peril.
Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., tweeted that Joe Biden was the first to use 9/11 as a reason to leave Afghanistan. He now desecrates this day by giving a ransom to the worst state sponsor of terrorism in the world. Shameful.”
Tuesday, Cotton said in remarks to reporters at the Capitol that the best way to stop Iran from kidnapping Americans was “not to use carrots in the amount of $6 billion, but rather to use sticks in the form of warnings to things that Iran holds dear.”
I don’t believe the extremist ayatollahs in Tehran will utilize this for children’s hospitals, he continued. Through their proxies, they’re going to utilize it to identify new opportunities to strike American forces in the area and Israel. They will employ it to deploy more drones and missiles to Russia in support of that country’s campaign of aggression against Ukraine.
Al Qaeda members, the majority of whom were Saudi citizens, carried out the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, not Iran.
The only Democratic senator eager to speak with reporters on the arrangement on Tuesday at the Capitol seemed to be Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va. Despite Iran’s assurances that the United States will utilize the unfrozen assets for humanitarian help, he expressed concern that “there are no guarantees of that.”
So, he said, “I’m extremely worried about this. We’re digging a lot deeper, but I’m really worried.
According to a senior administration official, the transaction should be finalized this month. According to Adrienne Watson, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council, “no individuals have been or are scheduled to be released into U.S. custody this week.”
In a recent interview with Lester Holt of NBC News in Tehran, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi stated that the $6 billion in previously frozen funds will be used any way the Iranian government sees fit.
According to U.S. officials, Qatar’s central bank will be in charge of the funds, which Iran can only use for humanitarian causes in accordance with U.S. sanctions.
However, Raisi stated in the interview that Iran would have “authority” over the use of the monies. According to a translation provided by the Iranian government, he declared that the Islamic Republic of Iran would determine what to do with the money because it belonged to the Iranian people and government.
Requests for comment regarding the GOP backlash on Tuesday were not immediately answered by the White House or the State Department.