[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 130 (Thursday, September 10, 2015)]
[House]
[Page H5876]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           IRAN NUCLEAR DEAL

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
California (Mr. McClintock) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I rise to express my deep disappointment 
in the decision by the House leadership to back off from a direct vote 
on a resolution of disapproval of the Iran nuclear accord as provided 
under the Corker Act.
  Clearly, the President has not complied with the requirements of 
Corker to provide Congress with the full text of its agreement with 
Iran, most specifically, the side deals referenced in the agreement 
between Iran and the IAEA.
  H. Res. 411, which declares the administration out of compliance with 
the Corker Act, is well-founded, but there is no reason to cancel the 
vote on the resolution disapproving the agreement as specified in the 
Corker Act and as promised by the House leadership for the last 6 
weeks.
  H. Res. 411 rightly disputes September 17 as the deadline for 
congressional action to stop this treaty from taking effect, and I 
support that resolution, but it cannot authoritatively settle this 
dispute. That leaves the deadline as an open question, and this House 
must not let that deadline pass without definite action as provided by 
Corker.
  I oppose the act because it guts the Treaty Clause of the 
Constitution that requires treaties to be ratified by a two-thirds vote 
of the U.S. Senate. Despite the President's contention that this is an 
agreement and not a treaty, the fact that it explicitly modifies the 
Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty makes it obvious that it requires 
Senate ratification.
  Unfortunately, the Congress overwhelmingly approved the Corker Act, 
establishing a very different framework with respect to this particular 
treaty. Instead of a two-thirds vote of the Senate to ratify it, 
Corker, in essence, requires two-thirds of both Houses to reject it 
through a resolution of disapproval, an almost impossible threshold.
  Under Corker, the resolution of disapproval is the specific legal act 
required to reject this treaty. This is what the leadership had 
promised the House would vote on this week, until yesterday. Now we are 
to vote on a legally meaningless bill to approve the treaty that is 
expected to be voted down. It is specifically designed to have no legal 
effect but merely to give Members political cover.
  Thus, the House will fail to take action on a resolution of 
disapproval called for under the Corker Act by the disputed September 
17 deadline. On that deadline, the President will declare victory, 
implement the treaty, and the Congress will be left sputtering. The 
world will correctly interpret this dereliction as a capitulation by 
the House to this treaty. And years from now, maybe, possibly, the 
courts will intervene to declare the President's action illegal or 
maybe not.
  Mr. Speaker, the House is right to dispute the September 17 deadline 
because clearly the President did not comply with provisions of Corker 
and provide the full text of the side agreements to the Congress; but 
the House is dead wrong to refuse to take action on the resolution of 
disapproval prior to the disputed deadline to assure that the House has 
spoken clearly, unambiguously, and indisputably according to the 
provisions of the Corker Act that the Congress, itself, enacted in May. 
Once it has acted, the House can still dispute whether the President's 
submission meets the requirements of Corker, but it will not have this 
momentous question dangling unresolved and in dispute.
  The argument we hear for this course is that the Senate is unlikely 
to take up a resolution of disapproval; therefore, we should hold the 
President to the letter of Corker. Well, what the Senate does is up to 
the Senate; but for our part, the House has a moral obligation to act 
within the undisputed timeframe to legally reject this dangerous action 
by the President.
  There is little doubt that this treaty will trigger a nuclear arms 
race in the Middle East. The leaders of Israel, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia 
have already made that abundantly clear. There is little doubt it is 
unverifiable.
  There is no doubt it will release $150 billion of frozen assets to 
Iran with which it can finance its terrorist operations and continue 
its nuclear research.

                              {time}  1100

  I fear the Iran nuclear agreement may be just as significant to the 
fate of the 21st century as the Munich Agreement was to the 20th 
century. The American people and the world deserve a clear, 
unambiguous, and indisputable act of the House to repudiate this act. 
What the House leadership is now pursuing falls far short of this moral 
imperative.

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