Democratic presidential candidate Jim Webb said he was opposed to the Iran nuclear agreement being aggressively pushed by the Obama administration, telling Fox News on Sunday that "I think it's a bad deal," according to The Weekly Standard.
Webb joins Republicans and a growing group of Democrats that have stated they oppose the agreement that President Obama has trumpeted as a "very good deal" to keep Iran from attaining a nuclear weapon. During his political push last week to garner enough support on Capitol Hill for the deal to survive, Obama compared Iranian hardliners who chant "Death to America" to the Republican caucus that has lined up against it.
However, key Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) announced he was also opposed to the deal last week, leading to a war of words with the White House that Webb said he found disheartening.
"I think we need to put country ahead of party," Webb said. "It troubles me when I see all this debate about whether this is disloyalty to the president or to the Democratic Party, particularly with what Chuck Schumer has gone through. I think I've always done that. I think that's what leadership really is, particularly in foreign policy."
Schumer said last week that "the very real risk that Iran will not moderate and will, instead, use the agreement to pursue its nefarious goals is too great.’’
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also stands adamantly against the deal. At a conference call organized by the Jewish Federation of North America (JFNA), Netanyahu said that the Iran deal "will bring war."
"The deal that was supposed to end nuclear proliferation will actually trigger nuclear proliferation," he said. "It will trigger an arms race in the Middle East, the most volatile region on the planet. That’s a real nightmare."