'We’ve been trying for months to get a debate and a vote,' Sen. McConnell says. | John Shinkle/POLITICO Republicans want Iran sanctions vote

Senate Republicans are demanding a vote on new Iran sanctions as part of an unrelated bill.

Still miffed that they didn’t get an Iran vote as part of a 2013 defense bill, the GOP has rolled sanctions language authored by Sens. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) into its alternative to the Democratic veterans benefits’ bill written by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).


By calling for the Senate to vote on a substitute written by Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), Republicans are hoping to force Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) into holding a vote that he has repeatedly spurned in recent months.

“We’ve been trying for months to get a debate and a vote on the Kirk-Menendez Iran sanctions bill,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell told reporters Tuesday. “We’ll be discussing it at length on the floor on why we should go forward with that legislation and why we ought to get a vote on it, because it’s a very time sensitive matter.”

The sanctions legislation would impose conditional economic penalties on Iran if the country fails to follow through on an interim deal or pulls out of ongoing global negotiations to permanently curtail its nuclear ambitions in return for some sanctions relief.

Republicans have fumed for months over a lack of floor votes on GOP proposals, and Reid told reporters he’s aiming to open up the amendment process on the veterans bill to include “relevant amendments.” But it’s not clear that would apply to anything that has to do with Iran.

“This is an issue that should be bipartisan. There shouldn’t be partisanship on this issue, and it is too bad, really too bad, that Republicans are trying to make an issue like this partisan,” Reid said when asked if he’d allow a vote on the GOP alternative with the Iran language.

While a number of Senate Democrats had previously voiced support for Iran sanctions, Democratic support for an immediate vote has collapsed in recent weeks after President Barack Obama and his administration warned that it could disrupt ongoing diplomatic talks with Iran.

The hawkish American Israel Public Affairs Committee has also said that now is not the time for a sanctions vote.

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