On Thursday’s broadcast of Bloomberg’s “Balance of Power,” Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) reacted to President Donald Trump’s announcement of secondary sanctions on purchasers of Iranian oil by stating that he generally supports pressuring the regime and “there is bipartisan support for increasing pressure to get Iran to the table, to try and get back into a more comprehensive deal, one that doesn’t have sunsets, one that includes some of their secondary support for terrorist proxies in the region, particularly, including the Houthis and their ballistic missile program.”
Co-host Kailey Leinz asked, “Well, and as we consider the issues your committee is looking at, the same issues that you were just alluding to, Marco Rubio is dealing with, we got some news from President Trump separate to this today about secondary sanctions on buyers of Iranian oil, trying to amp up pressure on the regime as they look for some kind of nuclear deal. Are you broadly supportive of measures like that? Is actually that what it takes to get Iran to the table?”
Coons answered, “I am broadly supportive of pressure on the Iranian regime. They are the greatest source of terrorism and chaos in the Middle East. And I do think that there is bipartisan support for increasing pressure to get Iran to the table, to try and get back into a more comprehensive deal, one that doesn’t have sunsets, one that includes some of their secondary support for terrorist proxies in the region, particularly, including the Houthis and their ballistic missile program. That would be a major diplomatic and security accomplishment if the Trump administration could get that done.”
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