President Obama made it clear that he did not trust the Iranians when he announced a nuclear deal with the rogue nation that was and is unpopular in the United States but was greeted with public celebrations in Tehran.
"And my hope is that building on this deal, we can continue to have conversations with Iran that incentivize them to behave differently in the region, to be less aggressive, less hostile, more cooperative, to operate the way we expect nations in the international community to behave," Obama said on July 15. "But we're not counting on it. So this deal is not contingent on Iran changing its behavior. It's not contingent on Iran suddenly operating like a liberal democracy."
He's maintained his tough talk in spite of Iran continuing to operate like the rogue, terror-sponsoring country it is, albeit with an infusion of billions of dollars in sanctions relief as a result of the nuclear agreement.
Some of Iran's deeds are summarized here by Free Beacon editor Matthew Continetti:
The Iran deal is another farce. In recent months the mullahs have taken an additional hostage, convicted a Washington Post reporter of espionage, launched ballistic missiles, fired rockets near a U.S. aircraft carrier, and waged proxy war in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen. The president’s response: no sanctions for missile violations, promises to exempt Iran from a tough U.S. visa law, a hands-off approach to Saudi-Iranian conflict. And of course sanctions relief for not testing a nuke.
Obama's reaction to a question about the American hostages held by Iran in July was to snap at the reporter who publicly embarrassed him on the issue.
"Nobody's content," Obama growled, in the midst of a celebratory presser about the agreement he wanted as badly as passing Obamacare in his first term.
There were no sanctions for Iran's tests of ballistic missiles, capable of delivering a nuclear warhead, performed in 2015 in breach of United Nations resolutions. Obama assured Americans that he had no "illusions about the Iranian government" he seemed so eager to make a deal with last summer, but his administration caved time after time on various aspects of the agreement.
Obama also discussed last summer how Iran has worked to destabilize the country's Gulf partners, but U.S. officials have had an indifferent response to Iran's recent aggression against Saudi Arabia.
As Continetti wrote, "If only Obama were this generous with Republicans."