McCaul: ‘President Obama’s Policies Embolden Iran’s Leaders’

Representative Michael McCaul (R-TX) slammed the Iran nuclear deal and declared, “President Obama’s policies embolden Iran’s leaders” during Saturday’s GOP Weekly Address.

Transcript as Follows:

“Earlier this week I had the honor of chairing the first-ever Congressional hearing at the 9/11 Memorial Museum at Ground Zero in New York.

The memorial sits on hallowed ground, consecrated by the loss of thousands of innocent Americans and by the valor and sacrifice of those who worked to save their lives.

In their honor, we vowed to “never forget” that day.  And our memories of the victims and heroes gave our nation the resolve we needed to embark on a generational struggle against Islamist terror.

Fourteen years after that fateful day, the struggle continues. The ranks of extremists are surging worldwide, and terrorist sanctuaries are proliferating.

Radical Sunni groups—from ISIS to al Qaeda—are spreading like wildfire across the globe.

But we cannot forget that the radical Shi’a regime in Iran remains the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism.

Iran’s leaders have called for our defeat and the destruction of our close ally, Israel.  The regime is responsible for more than 1,000 American casualties during the Iraq war, they have plotted a terrorist attack here in our Nation’s capital, and launched a destructive cyber-attacks against American companies.

Unfortunately, President Obama’s policies embolden Iran’s leaders.  Instead of countering the regime’s terrorist networks, the White House let them spread.

And the President allowed Iran to get closer to a nuclear weapon.  Over the last six years, Iran has defied international sanctions, completed an underground nuclear facility, and amassed a large stockpile of enriched uranium.

And now the President has struck a deal that he says will keep Iran from going nuclear.

Congress has spent several weeks reviewing this agreement and listening to the American people.  It is now clear that this deal will not stop a nuclear Iran—but will instead endanger America and our allies for years to come.

It will leave Iran with the ingredients for a bomb and the infrastructure to build it.  Rather than stopping nuclear proliferation, this puts the Middle East at the starting line of a nuclear arms race.

And it will give Iran a cash windfall, freeing up over $100 billion to fuel the regime’s global campaign of Islamist terror.

Incredibly, the agreement also fails to curb Iran’s intercontinental ballistic missiles, which the Ayatollah says, in his own words, they will now “mass produce.”  These weapons are designed to hit our country and to attack our allies.

Ronald Reagan’s famous negotiating advice was to ‘trust, but verify.’  But under this agreement, President Obama is saying trust Iran to verify.

It relies on secret side deals that the American people’s representatives were not allowed to see.  Inspections will no longer happen ‘anytime, anywhere.’  Instead, Iran can delay and will reportedly self-inspect its own nuclear sites. Iranian officials have also declared military locations off-limits.

Let us be clear-eyed about the deal.  This was not a negotiation with an honest government.  It was a negotiation with terrorists, who chant ‘Death to America’ and stand against freedom and democracy.

For the last decade, Congress has passed bipartisan sanctions to keep Iran from going nuclear.

Sadly, this agreement does not achieve that goal.  It puts Iran on a glide-path to a nuclear weapon and turns those hard-won sanctions into wasted effort.

But my colleagues who understand the threat from Iran—including Democrats and Republicans—will continue to stand against this agreement, for the sake of our nation’s security and in defense of the free world.”

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