Secretary Moniz: ‘We Will Be Implementing’ Iran Deal Regardless of What Congress Does

‘If we walk away we will walk away alone’

RUSH TRANSCRIPT:

MITCHELL: “But just to clarify, if John Boehner and this group that is pressuring him from inside the Republican caucus, if they have their way, they're going to try to push it beyond September 17th. What happens if the United States stands alone in not having let this agreement go through? What happens to the rest of the agreement?”

MONIZ: “Well, first of all, I certainly have no expectation that we will go beyond the 17th. I have every expectation that we will be entering an implementation phase on what is called adoption day, which is 90 days after the agreement was signed. So that's in the middle of October. And Iran, by the way, will have an enormous amount of work to accomplish in that -- in that time period. So, look, I think we will be going ahead. We will be implementing the agreement. If -- if for some reason the agreement were not to go ahead and I want to make it very clear, I have every expectation that it's going ahead. If it were not, then I could use the words of Brent schocroft, national security adviser to Ford and bush Sr. If we walk away we will walk away alone and probably in that situation be resigned to the worst of all possibilities a loss of international unity, a loss of international unity will almost certainly at least fray or unravel the sanctions regime. Iran would get additional economic activity without the requirements of rolling back its nuclear program dramatically, without the unprecedented verification requirements that we have put in place for a very, very long term."

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