The Patriot Post® · RNC: Biden's Appeasement Emboldened Iran

By the Republican National Committee

ANOTHER FOREIGN POLICY DISASTER

• The Biden administration’s pattern of weakness on the world stage and attempts at appeasement with terrorists in the Middle East have emboldened Iran.
  • As former Defense Secretary Bob Gates said, Biden “has been wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades.”
• As the largest state sponsor of terrorism, Iran’s fingerprints are all over Hamas’ terrorist attack against Israel, each year Hamas receives roughly $100 million from Iran.
  • Iran has also “delivered the technology and know-how that have enabled Hamas to build up its own arsenal of rockets in Gaza based on Iranian designs.”
• Hamas’ recent terrorist attack on Israel has killed at least 27 Americans and more than 1,300 Israelis, with many more Americans still missing or unaccounted for.
• For the Americans stranded in Israel who want to leave, Biden spokesperson John Kirby has told them to simply buy a commercial flight – as airlines increasingly suspend air service to Israel.

BIDEN HAS PURSUED A POLICY OF APPEASEMENT WITH IRAN

• Last month, the Biden administration released $6 billion in ransom to Iran in a lopsided prisoner exchange.
  • The administration knew there was a “high risk” doing so could boost Hamas, but did it anyway.
  • Despite the Biden administration’s claim that the funds would be restricted to humanitarian use, money is fungible, with the Iranian president declaring “authority” over the funds and saying they would be spent “wherever we need it.”
  • Following this weekend’s brutal Hamas terror attack in Israel, the administration has yet to refreeze these Iranian funds.
• Since Biden took office, his administration has relaxed oil sanctions enforcement and allowed Iran to profit on $80 billion in illicit oil sales, a five-year high for the largest state sponsor of terror.
• Meanwhile, Biden’s handpicked choice for special envoy to Iran, Rob Malley, is under investigation for mishandling classified documents and his alleged involvement in an Iran-backed spy campaign.
  • In 2010, Malley called it “a mistake to only think of [Hezbollah and Hamas] in their terrorist violence dimension … [Hamas] has a charity organization, a social branch … there’s so much misinformation about them.”

BIDEN WAS HELLBENT ON REJOINING THE DISASTROUS IRAN NUCLEAR DEAL

• Biden has spent his presidency tripping over himself to restore the Obama-era Iran deal, providing the world’s largest state sponsor of terror with concession after concession.
  • In an effort to entice Iran to rejoin the nuclear deal, the State Department announced it was waiving sanctions on Iran’s “civilian” nuclear program.
  • Biden failed to enforce sanctions that prohibit Iranian oil imports into China.
  • The administration continued to work with Russia on the nuclear deal during Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
• Iran’s “breakout time"— the time needed to produce enough fissile material for a nuclear weapon — is now at "zero.”
• As Biden bent over backwards for Iran, our enemies openly bragged about how great the Iran Nuclear Deal is for them.
  • Russia’s lead negotiator in the talks, Mikhail Ulyanov, said “Iran got much more than it could expect” in negotiations.
• Through his desperation to rejoin the deal, Biden ignored our closest ally in the region, Israel, who raised serious concerns over the U.S. reentering the deal.
• Last December, Biden finally said the deal is “dead,” but stressed that the U.S. won’t formally announce it.
• Biden falsely blamed the previous Republican administration for the rise in Iran’s nuclear power rather than his own policies.
  • According to one U.N. watchdog, Iran has been enriching large amounts of uranium and has been withholding footage of its monitoring in nuclear sites since 2021.

BIDEN HAS A HISTORY OF ATTEMPTING TO APPEASE AND DEFEND IRAN

• In 1998, Senator Biden voted against sanctioning Russian businesses selling missile technology to Iran.
• Just weeks after the September 11, 2001 attacks, Biden said it “seems to me this would be a good time to send, no strings attached, a check for $200 million to Iran.”
• In 2002, Biden supported Iran’s bid to the World Trade Organization and opposed U.S. intervention in the struggle for democracy in Iran.
• In 2007, Senator Biden voted against designating the Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization.
  • During the 2008 presidential primary debates, Biden doubled down, calling it a “serious mistake” to called the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and the Quds force a terrorist organization.
• In 2007, Biden threatened to impeach President Bush if the U.S. went to war with Iran.
• During the 2008 presidential primary debates, Biden said “Iran is not a nuclear threat to the United States of America.”
• As a senator, Biden called for direct engagement with Iran, even repeatedly offering to meet with Iranian politicians himself.
• As vice president, Biden was the White House’s “top salesperson” for the Iran Nuclear Deal, claiming the deal would make the U.S. and Israel “safer, not weaker.”
  • Biden continued to tout his involvement with the 2015 Iran nuclear deal during his 2020 campaign, saying “I’m the guy that helped put together the Iran deal and got the inspectors in there.”
  • As part of the deal with Iran, the U.S. agreed to a $1.7 billion settlement – sending pallets of cash to the world’s largest state sponsor of terrorism.
  • Biden defended the cash payments despite John Kerry, his own advisor, admitting that some of money went to fund terrorism.
• During the 2020 presidential election, Biden criticized President Trump for killing Iranian terrorist Qasem Soleimani, saying he wouldn’t have ordered the strike.

Originally posted here.