It also suggests that just as the Treasury Department went to bureaucratic war with leaks and objections to the State Department’s insistence on facilitating Iran’s ability to conduct dollar transaction, Justice too was aligned against the constant give-aways the White House and Secretary of State John F. Kerry backed to mollify the nonexistent “moderates” in Iran.

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Elliott Abrams, who served in both the National Security Council and the State Department explains, “What we’ve been told is that Justice objected but was overruled by State. That can’t be right: they are two co-equal Cabinet departments.” He continues, “So what happened was that Justice objected and the White House said ‘Shut up.’ Obviously, the professional staff at DOJ, of whom I’d bet 100 percent voted for Obama, were so angry that people began to leak.” He adds, “Of course, discipline always breaks down as an administration ends, but this leak shows how rotten the Obama decision to bribe Iran and ransom hostages truly was. We can only hope that Clinton sees all of this, sees how rotten it looks and decides not to repeat it.”

In any event, the new revelation brought predictable reaction. Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), a staunch critic of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, released a statement: “With the news that the Department of Justice raised alarms about a $400 million cash ransom, the only way this gets worse is if Air Force One made the drop-off. It’s not hard to figure out why the DOJ sounded the alarm because President Obama said it himself: paying ransoms puts American lives at risk and bankrolls terrorism.”

The good news is that when the new president takes office she will have a critical segment of the executive branch (Justice and Treasury) primed to take a tougher stand with Iran. As a former secretary of state, she’ll need to insist — if she really does want to beef up our stance toward Iran — her pick for secretary and other appointed officials get in line with any White House-Justice-Treasury initiatives. It is hardly news that the State Department is more willing to accede to our foes’ demands for the sake of preserving its “diplomacy” (in this case, a horribly one-sided deal that has now distorted our approach to the region and horrified our allies).

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