He called the end-around by 47 Republicans a “juvenile” attack and an attempt to undermine Obama “purely out of spite.” Reid blasts GOP's Iran letter: 'Hard slap in the face'

Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid angrily denounced a Republican-led effort to circumvent President Barack Obama’s pursuit of a nuclear deal with Iran, calling it “hard slap in the face” of the United States.

As Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), the engineer of a letter that panned Obama’s effort as merely an “executive agreement,” watched from the presiding officer’s chair on Monday afternoon, Reid called the end-around by 47 Republicans a “juvenile” attack and an attempt to undermine Obama “purely out of spite.”


“The judgment of my Republican colleagues seems to be clouded by their abhorrence of President Obama. The Republican senators sent a letter to the Iranian leadership aimed at sabotaging these negotiations,” Reid said. “It’s unprecedented for one political party to directly intervene in an international negotiation with the sole goal of embarrassing the president.”

On Monday morning, Cotton and dozens of his GOP colleagues sent a letter to the Iranian leadership, urging Tehran to regard any deal without congressional approval as an executive agreement that could be undone by a future president with the “stroke of a pen.” But while Republicans viewed the letter as a reminder to Iran of Congress’ responsibilities, Democrats said the move could eventually lead to another conflict in the Middle East if it causes nuclear talks to fall apart.

“I would describe this letter as a continuation of a partisan strategy to undermine the president’s ability to conduct foreign policy and advance our national security interests around the globe,’’ White House spokesman Josh Earnest said.

After Reid’s speech, he and his top deputy Dick Durbin of Illinois held a colloquy in front of Cotton. Durbin asked Reid if Cotton and his colleagues realized that one alternative to the ongoing nuclear talks “could be another war in the Middle East.”

“Everyone should acknowledge that if we can work something out with Iran so they don’t get nuclear weapons, we’ve got to try to do that,” Reid responded. Obama “has said there’s less than a 50 percent chance he can get it done. But shouldn’t we let him try?”

The partisan fireworks over the GOP letter came just as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) delayed a vote on a bill that would allow Congress to reject an agreement with Iran from the Senate calendar.