Kerry to Congress: ‘Give Us the Space and the Time’ to Complete Iran Nuclear Deal
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Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) — Secretary of State John Kerry urged Congress to give the administration some “space and time” to complete a Iran nuclear deal.
“We have two and a half months more to negotiation,” Kerry said as he headed into a classified briefing with members of the House of Representatives Monday evening. “It’s a serious amount of time with some serious business still to do, so we hope Congress will listen carefully and ask the questions that it wants, but also give us the space and the time to be able to complete a very difficult task which has high stakes for our country.”
The secretary of state questioned whether critics have accurately depicted the framework that was agreed to last week — about which both Iranian negotiators and those from the Obama administration seem to have opposing descriptions.
Kerry said he was pleased to have the chance to discuss the situation with the members of the House, “because there have been a lot of representations, misrepresentations, a lot of questions raised — and it’s good to have an opportunity to really be able to discuss with people what is really contained within the parameters, and also to lay down some of the work that we have left to do.”
Despite criticism from some lawmakers, such as the 47 Republican senators who signed a letter earlier this year warning the Iranian government that a deal not approved by the U.S. Congress won’t be consitutional, Kerry remains optimistic that he can shift the sense Congress has of the potential deal. “We’ll wait and see,” Kerry said Monday. “That’s why we’re here.”
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