Senators Take on Obama over Iran Sanctions

The Cable reports that a bipartisan group of Senators have sent a letter to the Chairmen of the Iran sanctions conference, laying down the gauntlet regarding changes sought by the Obama Administration for the final bill, as well as multilateral efforts being pursued by the Administration.

The letter highlights the infamous Gates memo, in which Defense Secretary Gates stated that Iran could potentially assemble all the parts needed for a nuclear weapon “but stop just short of assembling a fully operational weapon.”  The Senators write that this is a reminder “that there is little time left to wait for tough new multilateral sanctions – from the United Nations or otherwise.”

However, Gates was warning that Iran may pursue the Japan model instead of seeking to become a full blown nuclear power; if anything he was calling for a serious evaluation of U.S. policy options should sanctions fail to dissuade Iran from pursuing this model, not supporting the letter’s argument that we should all panic and abandon other tools so we can rush forward with unilateral sanctions.  If there is an argument for how much time we have available to develop and pursue better options, Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. James Cartwright assessed that Iran could not have a nuclear weapon for at least two to five years.

NIAC Welcomes Senate Passage of Iran Human Rights Resolution

Washington, DC – The National Iranian American Council applauds the Senate’s passage yesterday of S.Res.355, which condemned Iran’s deplorable human rights record, urged the restoration of meaningful human rights to all of Iran’s citizens, and called for an immediate release of those wrongfully imprisoned in violation of their rights.

NIAC President Trita Parsi called the resolution “a step forward” in bringing greater worldwide attention to Iran’s human rights abuses against innocent civilians.  “US policymakers have to bring a greater focus to the human rights problems in Iran; a strategy that focuses only on Iran’s nuclear program and ignores the suffering of the Iranian people will not be successful” Parsi said.

Senator Carl Levin (D-MI) addressed the Senate chamber yesterday about Iran’s human rights abuses, saying “recent events have made abundantly clear that the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran is failing, and failing badly, to live up to its own professed ideals and its international commitments to protect the human rights of its citizens and others.”  He, alongside Senators McCain (R-AZ), Casey (D-PA), Graham (R-SC), Nelson (R-NE), Corker (R-TN), and Lieberman (I-CT), submitted the resolution earlier this week and secured its passage in only two days.

Speaking of the resolution, Senator Levin, who chairs the Senate’s Armed Services Committee, said “It is proper and appropriate for the Senate to make clear its determination that these acts violate international human rights standards, Iran’s own professed commitments, and common decency.”

A similar but unrelated resolution supporting the Iranian people’s struggle for rights is pending in the House of Representatives, introduced last week by Rep. Kay Granger (R-TX) with Rep. Sue Myrick (R-NC), and Rep. Jack Kingston (R-GA).  So far, Representatives Wolf (R-VA), Shuler (D-NC), and Manzullo (R-IL) have signed on to that effort.

Senate Adopts Measure to Counter Censorship in Iran

Cross Posted from www.niacouncil.org

Washington DC – Last night, the Senate voted unanimously to adopt legislation that aims to aid the ability of the Iranian people to access news and information by overcoming the electronic censorship and monitoring efforts of the Iranian government.

The Victims of Iranian Censorship (VOICE) Act was introduced by Senators John McCain (R-AZ), Joseph Lieberman (ID-CT), Ted Kaufman (D-DE), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), and Robert Casey (D-PA) as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act.

Here’s the dish on the new committee leadership

Trusted sources have confirmed that Senator John Rockefeller will step down from his chairmanship of the Select Intelligence Committee to assume the all powerful post of Commerce Committee chair. The Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation is the counterpart of Energy and Commerce in the House and deals with issues pertaining to interstate commerce, transportation, science and technology, and consumer products regulation among others.

California Senator Diane Feinstein will take over as chair of Select Intelligence, which is charged with overseeing US intelligence agencies and assuring that they provide the executive and the legislative branch the accurate and timely information it needs to make critical national security decisions. The fifteen member committee receives regular intelligence briefings that other members are not privy to and holds closed hearings on sensitive national security issues.

Breaking: Last-Minute Push for Iran Sanctions in Congress

Last night, a number of frantic emails from colleagues and Hill staffers revealed that, despite previous signs that proposed Iran sanctions were dead in the water, a bill will be considered either today or tomorrow to impose further sanctions on Iran because of its nuclear program.

In a last-minute maneuver, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Howard Berman (D-CA) introduced draft legislation to approve of a sanctions package similar to S.3445, introduced in the Senate by Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT). (See: NIAC’s analysis of the Dodd sanctions package)

Congress set to adjourn without passing new Iran sanctions

Members of the House and Senate conference committee finished their work today to finalize the language on the defense authorization bill.  They did not include any new sanctions on Iran in the versions passed by either house of Congress, effectively ending (for this legislative session) the chance of another round of Iran sanctions being passed.

The conference report is posted at http://armedservices.house.gov/

Update: Defense Authorization Passes without Iran Amendments, More to Come…

Last night at 6:30pm, the Senate voted 88-8 to approve the Defense Authorization Act of 2009 (S. 3001)  without taking up nearly 100 pending amendments, including new Iran sanctions proposed by Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT).

The Senate spent the last two weeks debating these proposed amendments, but in the end failed to approve of any of them — though it could still be possible that the final version will contain most or all of them.  But Congress will certainly have to work hard to finalize an agreement in time to adjourn next week.

The bill now moves to a conference committee made up of select Representatives and Senators who will work out a compromise over differences between the House and Senate versions of the bill.  Aides are predicting that the nearly 100 proposed amendments could still be approved by the conference committee and attached to the final version that President Bush signs into law. 

The Iranian American vote

I have often been asked, “There are so many Iranian Americans in California, how come the Presidential candidates are not asking for our votes?”

This is a good place to start our discussions about the Iranian-American voter and our potential impact on electoral politics. There are so many factors that help determine the relative impact of any community on the political process, and certainly the number of potential voters is one important variable.

(Below the fold I’m going to start our discussion about the potential impact of our community on the political debate, and begin a series on the 2008 election cycle…)