Rep. Lee Zeldin Discusses Democrat’s National Security Fraud

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Frank Gaffney: We’re back, I couldn’t be more pleased to say joined by another distinguished member of the U.S. House of Representatives; he is New York first District Representative, Representative Lee Zeldin. He is a Major in the United States Army Reserves, an Intelligence Officer by training and practice with the 82 Airborne for part of his career in the military. He went on to become the Federal Prosecutor. He is today a member, as I said, of the Congress on the Foreign Affairs Committee notably working on two of its particularly relevant subcommittees: the Terrorism, Nonproliferation, and Trade Subcommittee, and the Middle East and North Africa Subcommittee. Congressman Zeldin welcome back its good to have you with us sir.

Rep. Lee Zeldin: Good to be back on with you

FG: You’ve been playing a leading role, particularly for a freshman member I might say, on the Iran deal. We were talking earlier in the program with Congressman Chris Stewart about it. I’d love to get your perspective on how it looks today. We’ve had almost 60 days of fulminations about it, has it improved with age?

LZ: The more that we learn about the Iran nuclear deal the more we are filled with an overwhelming amount of reasons to oppose it. The President still hasn’t turned over the verification agreement, as outlined in the side deal between the IAEA and Iran, and so you know the President, he might have a speech where he’s saying this deals not built on trust its built on verification. How can we possibly support a deal? How can anyone support a deal built on verification without knowing what even the verification is, which still hasn’t been turned over by law to Congress? So with what we know about the deal, what’s in it, what’s off the table completely, this deal does nothing to stop the financing terror it actually increases it, it doesn’t make it any harder for Iran to overthrow foreign governments, Iran continues to develop ICBMs, and unjustly imprison U.S. citizens. The list goes on with stuff that wasn’t in the deal, and with what we learn about what’s in it, still waiting to find out what the verification regime is, opposition is only growing and specifically opposition amongst partisan Republicans. You know this is the American public, this includes Democrats, who are seeing the light and realizing that for our national security this deal has to be stopped.

FG: You have expressed yourself rather directly on this subject, that it appears at least quite a number of Democrats in both your chamber of the House and over in the Senate, have put partisan considerations, loyalty to the President notably, ahead of their obligation to provide for the common defense. Is this in fact, witting in your view knowing what you do, what many many Americans now do about this deal, and if so doesn’t this really compound what I consider to be national security fraud, in a way, that is going to be a lasting burden on Democrats who vote for this agreement?

LZ: Well history will absolutely prove, unfortunately so, for our national security; history is going to prove that those supporting this deal are propping up the wrong regime in Iran, and there will be countless instance one after another, of the leverage that was lost at the table, or maybe fast forward thirteen years from now and Iran having a nuclear arsenal. There are so many different examples ahead of how those who are supporting this deal are going to be proven to be on the wrong side of history. The only reason to support this deal is out of blind loyalty to the President. I have not come across a single person who is supporting this deal independent of blind loyalty to the President, and for someone who maybe caught a graphic on maybe a TV screen from some national network news outlet that tells them that this deal provides for 24/7, where necessary, when necessary inspections, and they are just going to take it at face value assuming what’s being put in front of them is accurate, not realizing that the news outlet is just repeating what the President said verbatim. The fact is the deal itself doesn’t provide for 24/7, where necessary, when necessary access, that the President says we can inspect military sites that doesn’t make for accurate reporting. When that’s put up on a big screen and the reality is before, during, and after the negotiations Iranians said, ‘you’ll never inspect our military site’. So you have blind loyalty to the President, people not asking the right questions, there’s no good reason to support this deal.

FG: You have also taken the time to go take stock of the implications of this ObamaBomb deal as I call it, in one of the most important, if not the most important of our allies, during the August recess was a Congressional delegation that visited Israel. Give us a read from that first hand on sight inspection if you will, of whether the kinds of concerns that Benjamin Netanyahu has been expressing are valid, and what do you make of the fact that he’s now coming under some criticism within Israel for having said the truth about this deal in the United States and elsewhere?

LZ: Well you know too that last rumor that some might be trying desperately to start. I met not only with the Prime Minister I also met with the opposition leader, Isaac Herzog. They’re coming right off a hotly contested national election, where all the polling right up until the end, the pundits, the reporting was saying that Herzog was going to be the next Prime Minister. The way that the Knesset works, every Monday they have a vote, where Herzog tries to get a majority of members of the Knesset to dissolve the government and force a new election. Yet despite that key role as opposition leader, he is a hundred percent in unison with the call of the Prime Minister, with the call of the Israeli President, their government is all unanimously opposed to this deal. As you know as reference from just pointing to the Likud party, led by the Prime Minister and the President, and the opposition party led by Herzog. Now this isn’t just about Iran having a nuclear arsenal in thirteen years, which is something that the entire Middle East is concerned with I guess, unless you’re Assad in Syria, or Hezbollah, or Hamas. But you know just a year ago, 12,000 rockets were being fired from Hamas in Gaza in the south, 12,000 rockets were being fired from Hezbollah in Lebanon from the North, and over the course of the last year Hezbollah has increased their goal. They want to have 75-100,000 rockets to launch into Israel. They moved it three miles back from the border so that schools, and hospitals, and protected religious sites, and now they are funded, they report directly to Qasem Soleimani reports directly to the Ayatollah and here we are with this deal giving sanctions relief to Qasem Soleimani and Iran, and the Quds forces, and just think of the benefit that is known to be provided to Hamas and Hezbollah and the consequences for a country like Israel just trying to exist and defend itself. The threat is so real and the consequences are so certain.

FG: Congressman Lee Zeldin we only have a minute left just very quickly, is it your view that far from eliminating the danger of war this deal is actually going to intensify that danger?

LZ: Exactly right and I spoke at the Stop the Iran Deal rally in front of the U.S. Capitol and as one of the speakers I took the opportunity to point out that I don’t oppose this deal because I want war, I oppose this deal because I want to prevent it, and there is a huge gap between silence and war, and just because your advocating for any option other than silence doesn’t mean that you want war, it means you know there is a better path, a smarter path to prevent it. This Iran deal is a path that actually destabilizes the Middle East and will trigger a nuclear arms race in the region just another major reason to oppose it.

FG: Congressman Lee Zeldin thank you for your leadership in the Congress on this matter. We pray your insights and wisdom will be heeded by both your colleagues in the House and in the Senate as well. Keep up the good work sir and come back to us very soon if you would.