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Kerry, Rubio Spar Over Iran Negotiations

A Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing Wednesday on an Authorization for Use of Military Force against the Islamic State terror group became a hotbed for debate over an emerging nuclear weapons agreement between Iran and the United States, as Secretary of State John Kerry found himself defending negotiations between the two nations amid questions over whether the U.S. strategy against ISIS was being influenced by the Iran talks.

“There is no grand bargain being discussed here in the context of this negotiation. This is about a nuclear weapon potential. That’s it,” Kerry said. “And the president has made it absolutely clear they will not get a nuclear weapon. Now the presumption by a lot of people up on the Hill here has been that we somehow aren’t aware of that goal even as we negotiate that goal … and it’s really almost insulting that the presumption here is that we’re going negotiate something that allows them to get a nuclear weapon.”

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