Iran deal advocates prepare to battle Pompeo nomination
President Trump’s pick to replace Rex Tillerson at the State Department has called the Iran agreement “disastrous” and threatened military action against Iran.
President Donald Trump’s shock Twitter announcement today that he’s replacing Secretary of State Rex Tillerson with Iran hard-liner Mike Pompeo immediately generated considerable backlash from advocates who fear that he could precipitate the president’s threats to pull out of the Iran nuclear deal.
Trump’s next opportunity to reimpose sanctions lifted under the 2015 nuclear deal falls on May 12. The president had tasked Tillerson with negotiating new restrictions on Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile program with European partners by then, a tight deadline only complicated by today’s announcement.
Pompeo, who currently leads the CIA, has called for “rolling back” what he called a “disastrous” nuclear agreement negotiated under President Barack Obama. As a Republican congressman from Kansas during diplomatic negotiations in 2014 he went even further, hinting at military action.
“It is under 2,000 sorties to destroy the Iranian nuclear capacity,” Pompeo told reporters at the time. “This is not an insurmountable task for the coalition forces.”
