Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Bob Corker said Wednesday that efforts to resolve House concerns with a bipartisan Senate sanctions bill targeting Russia and Iran have hit a new snag. | Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images Russia-Iran sanctions talks hit new hiccup

An overwhelmingly bipartisan Senate sanctions bill targeting Russia and Iran hit a new snag Wednesday, as Democrats sought assurances that House Republicans will not water it down after what the GOP has billed as a simple fix.

Senior senators have negotiated with their counterparts across the Capitol since the sanctions bill, passed by the Senate on a 98-2 vote, ran into a constitutional objection in the House last week.


But when Democrats — aware that the White House is urging House Republicans to make the sanctions bill more friendly to President Donald Trump — asked the GOP to commit to no new, significant changes in the House, that commitment didn't arrive, according to a senior Senate Democratic aide.

Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), a leader in the bicameral sanctions talks, declared Democrats' response "self-defeating" and "actually accommodating Russia" by furthering the delay in the legislation.

"It is a ridiculous position to take that you’re not going to let our bill go to the House in an appropriate manner until you know exactly how the House is going to deal with a bill we passed," Corker told reporters Wednesday.

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Before the partisan tensions bubbled over, a deal on a technical fix to the sanctions package appeared within reach as the latest proposal earned sign-off from Corker's Democratic counterpart on the committee, Maryland Sen. Ben Cardin.

For Democrats who fought hard for language in the bill that hamstrings Trump's ability to warm relations with Vladimir Putin's government, however, the prospect of diluting the sanctions package in the House is hard to swallow.

"House Republicans have also not committed that this is the last change bill would undergo," the Democratic aide said. "We are happy to make changes to the bill to deal with the problem, provided it doesn’t weaken or fundamentally alter the core of the bill. We need assurances that that’s it, that bill is not going to be weakened or watered down in the House."

The crux of the sanctions delay has been a provision in the Senate-passed bill that allows Congress to block Trump from easing or ending sanctions against Russia. Changing sanctions policy would affect federal revenue, and the Constitution requires any bills that change revenue to start in the House — triggering a so-called "blue slip" delay that has stalled the Senate-initiated legislation from moving forward.

Democrats have raised repeated concerns that the White House plans to push House Republicans to dilute the congressional review provision to make it friendlier to the president. House Republicans have pushed back against the suggestion of any such political motivations behind their procedural holdup of the Senate bill.

House Foreign Affairs Chairman Ed Royce (R-Calif.) told Fox News on Wednesday that "now that the Senate has some time on its hands" with the postponement of a health care vote, "it should fix the constitutional problem in the bill."

“We need to send this message to Putin and to Russia that there will be consequences for their intervention in undermining democracies around the world," Royce added.

As recently as Tuesday afternoon, Cardin said he was inclined to sign off on the House's proposed change to the congressional review provision.

"I think I'm okay with it" based on a staff-level review of the House-drafted language, Cardin told reporters, warning that other Democrats may not have all agreed.

The proposed revisions to the sanctions bill should not change its effect "if interpreted properly," Cardin told reporters, but "we're not sure that's the holdup to passing it." Democrats suspect the Russia bill's delay may be "a little bit more Machiavellian" in nature, the Maryland Democrat added.

The Senate's bill imposes new sanctions against Moscow and codifies existing sanctions into law, while also adding new penalties against Tehran related to its ballistic missile program, human rights violations and support for terrorist groups.

One source described the changes under consideration for the sanctions bill as technical rather than substantive, adding that the House Rules Committee had also identified a minor issue that could be in line for a fix.