Some members of the Obama administration have apparently been going around the Trump administration and communicating with leaders in Iran. This is a potential violation of the Logan Act, and certainly a violation of political norms.
The Daily Beast reports:
Team Obama Tells Iran: Don’t Escalate, Don’t Take Trump’s Bait
As the Trump administration sent warplanes and an aircraft carrier to the Persian Gulf, a small group of former Obama administration officials reached out to their contacts in the Iranian government, including Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif. Their message to Iran: Don’t take Trump’s bait. Stay calm.
Conversations between former Obama officials and Iranian government officials have been ongoing since November 2016. Zarif, who visits the U.S. every year for the U.N. General Assembly in New York, usually meets with lawmakers, think tanks, journalists, and former officials when he is in town.
But the recent round of conversations, which took place over the phone and in person over the last two months, came as lines of communication between the U.S. and Iran, through intermediaries in Europe and elsewhere, deteriorated.
The U.S. policy toward Iran—a scorched-earth campaign to crush the country’s economy—took a turn this month when the Trump administration, following new Iranian activity that concerned American intelligence and national-security officials, sent ships and B-52 bombers to the region in a show of force. That move fed fears of military conflict between the two powers.
Can you even imagine how Democrats and their friends in the media would have reacted if the Bush administration had done this to Obama?
People on Twitter are speaking out about this:
Former Obama officials have been working with Iran and friends on the Hill to isolate the Trump admin. Their most recent contacts were a couple weeks ago. They told @thedailybeast that them secretly talking to Iran is "normal" https://t.co/OcenW1KuMq
— Omri Ceren (@omriceren) May 31, 2019
Sounds like a Logan Act violation! Commence the wiretaps. https://t.co/CQg4vsckib
— Mark Hemingway (@Heminator) May 31, 2019
FBI better meet with every one of them under deceptive friendly pretenses, spring an interrogation on them, and then bring felony charges for any misstatement or misremembering of facts
That’s the Sally Yates maneuver https://t.co/0ZUXLK9x6z
— Buck Sexton (@BuckSexton) May 31, 2019
Yet our intel agencies won’t provide “surveillance” on them? Oh yeah, I forgot, they only spy on Conservatives.
— RickJohnsen (@RickJohnsen2) June 1, 2019
That last comment is so true.
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