Iran letter blowback startles GOP

Tehran, March 12, IRNA -- Some Republican senators admitted they were caught off guard by the backlash to a letter warning Iranian leaders against a nuclear agreement with President Barack Obama. And Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said Republicans — many of whom blessed the missive during a brisk signing session at a Senate lunch a week ago, as senators prepared to flee a Washington snowstorm — should have given it closer consideration. “It was kind of a very rapid process. Everybody was looking forward to getting out of town because of the snowstorm,” McCain said. “I think we probably should have had more discussion about it, given the blowback that there is.” On this at least, Democrats and Republicans found agreement. “I find it hard to believe that they understood the severity of what they were doing,” said Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.). Though none of the 47 Republican signers has expressed regret for co-signing it, the missive, authored by freshman Sen. Tom Cotton, is creating unexpected fallout in Congress. And it threatens to linger politically and legislatively. Sensing a public relations advantage, the campaign arm for Senate Democrats quickly circulated newspaper op-eds criticizing Republicans who signed the missive and strategists said the issue will soon show up in TV ads in states of vulnerable senators. Democratic leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) took to the Senate floor for a second time to blast Republican “gimmicks” on Iran and Secretary of State John Kerry called it a “stunning” breach of protocol after being teed up by a question from a Democratic senator at a committee hearing. On the legislative front, a fragile bipartisan coalition of Iran hawks, who had been approaching a veto-proof majority for legislation that could potentially scuttle any U.S.-Iran nuclear agreement, was showing signs of cracking, as some centrist senators warned they were close to backing away from the measure. Sen. Angus King of Maine, an independent who caucuses with the Democrats, said in an interview he currently backs the legislation designed to give the Senate more input on a nuclear deal, but he cautioned that the Iran letter is making him think twice. “If I’m not convinced that this issue can be handled on the merits and not on a partisan basis,” he said, “then I’m going to change my mind.” The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee wasted little time in using negative coverage of the letter as grist for the campaign trail. Throughout the day officials took aim at vulnerable incumbents by blasting out a series of newspaper editorials including one from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, which wrote that Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) and his colleagues should be “ashamed” for signing the letter. In an interview, Toomey said he “didn’t have any particular anticipation of the level of controversy” surrounding the letter. Ohio’s Democratic former governor and current Senate candidate, Ted Strickland, lit into GOP incumbent Sen. Rob Portman for his “reckless” support of the letter. In an interview, Portman said he wasn’t even aware of the attack from Strickland or of Democrats’ circulation of a Cleveland Plain Dealer editorial that bashed the “usually rational” senator. Instead, Portman said Democrats, especially those in the White House, are viewing the letter all wrong. Multiple Democratic strategists predicted there would be more political repercussions to come for Republicans. One said there’s “no question” that Democrats will run ads attacking Republicans who signed onto the letter. “It’s not helpful, I can say that for sure,” Casey said. “Everything that has been done with the Iranian nuclear issue for years has been bipartisan. Why would people go in the direction of not having it bipartisan?”