Democratic Senator Opposes ‘Rush’ To Impose New Iran Sanctions
The top Democrat on the U.S. Senate Banking Committee said on Tuesday he did not want to rush to vote on legislation to impose more sanctions on Iran, speaking a day after the panel said it would delay hearings on the issue for a week.
“There’s not a rush on this. These negotiations are going forward. I don’t want to disrupt the negotiations,” Senator Sherrod Brown, the ranking member of the banking committee, told reporters at the U.S. Capitol.
The banking committee had been scheduled to hold public and classified hearings on Iran this week, ahead of debate and a vote on Thursday on a bill sponsored by Republican Senator Mark Kirk and Democrat Robert Menendez to impose more sanctions if there is no nuclear agreement by the end of June.
But the panel said on Monday it would wait until next week to hold hearings. Brown referred questions about the reason for the delay to Senator Richard Shelby, the panel’s chairman. Shelby aides could not immediately be reached for comment.
Diplomats said Sunday that Iran and major powers would meet again next month to try to narrow differences over Tehran’s nuclear program.
President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron on Friday urged members of Congress to hold off on legislation, saying it would upset international talks and increase the likelihood of a military confrontation with Tehran.
Obama is also expected to encourage Congress not to move toward sanctions during his annual State of the Union address on Tuesday night.
Brown said administration officials have been talking to lawmakers about the bill, and that committee members, especially new ones, needed more information before moving ahead.
It’s our birthday and we’re still celebrating!
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news.
This week we celebrate 129 years of the Forward. We’re proud of our origins as a Yiddish print publication serving Jewish immigrants. And we’re just as proud of what we’ve become today: A trusted source of Jewish news and opinion, available digitally to anyone in the world without paywalls or subscriptions.
We’ve helped five generations of American Jews make sense of the news and the world around them — and we aren’t slowing down any time soon.
As a nonprofit newsroom, reader donations make it possible for us to do this work. Support independent, agenda-free Jewish journalism and our board will match your gift in honor of our birthday!
