During an interview with the “Fox News Rundown” podcast released on Monday, Rep. Michael Waltz (R-FL) stated that while the unfreezing of Iranian funds under the prisoner swap brokered by the Biden administration was a terrible move, the Biden administration has done far more to fund Iran and its terror proxies by allowing Iran to sell huge amounts of oil.
Waltz said, [relevant remarks begin around 5:15] “A lot of people are making a lot of hay over the 6 billion, the funds that were released from South Korea and other countries in exchange for Americans held hostage in Iran. I 100% disagree with the administration. I think that money is absolutely fungible. They’re pointing out that it was only to be used for humanitarian aid, and that may [or] may not be true. But everyone knows, if you have an amount of money coming in, it frees up money to use for something else. And, in this case, I firmly believe for its terror proxies.”
He continued, “But the much bigger deal is the blind eye the Biden administration has turned towards allowing Iran to once again sell oil. Under the maximum pressure campaign of the Trump administration, it was down to a few hundred thousand barrels per day. Now, it’s back up to record highs of several million barrels per day. And that’s generating — according to The Wall Street Journal and other reporting — nearly $30 billion a year. That completely dwarfs that hostage money. And that is what Iran is using to fuel its proxies.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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