White House shrugs off Schumer’s decision on Iran deal

Already facing nearly guaranteed unanimous opposition from the GOP in both the House and the Senate, and an ever eroding base of support from his own party, the defection of Schumer, arguably the most high profile and high ranking member of the Democrats in the Senate, will now provide cover for other senators leery of making any sort of deal with Iran as well, who may have been on the fence about the issue. His announcement Thursday night came just hours after two other Senate Democrats – New York’s Kirsten Gillibrand and New Hampshire’s Jeanne Shaheen – announced their support for the global accord.

“The truth of the matter is, inside of Iran, the people most opposed to the deal are the Revolutionary Guard, the Quds Force, hardliners who are implacably opposed to any cooperation with the worldwide community”, Obama said.

The administration, however, has disputed that the deals are secretive, instead referring to them as standard technical arrangements, the contents of which will be shared with Congress in a classified briefing.

A leading Jewish Democrat, Schumer was the first senator of Obama’s party to step forward to oppose the deal. His decision also put him at odds with the Democrats’ likely presidential nominee, Hillary Rodham Clinton, who has cautiously embraced the deal.

Schumer’s decision is a blow to the administration, though it remains to be seen how many other Democratic lawmakers follow the New York senator.

House and Senate Republicans have enough votes to pass a resolution of disapproval next month, but Obama is widely expected to veto that resolution and Republicans will then try to overturn the veto. And Donald Trump said it was “a disgrace” for a president “who doesn’t have a clue”.

Schumer – a congressional ally of Israel, a leading fundraiser and strategist for his party and a lawmaker from a state that is home to more than a million-and-a-half Jews – had been under intense pressure.

“Even more troubling is the fact that the U.S. can not demand inspections unilaterally”.

Faced with uniform GOP opposition, the administration has targeted Democrats, and 21 of the 188 House Democrats have announced their support while nine oppose the deal. Steve Israel and Nita Lowey of New York and Ted Deutch of Florida. Tammy Baldwin and Vermont Independent Bernie Sanders endorsed the deal, bringing the number of Senate backers to 15.

“That’s an absurd argument, and it’s the one they’ve made from the very beginning, that it’s either what the President negotiates with the Iranians or it’s war“, McConnell said.