At the Voters First Presidential Forum in New Hampshire Monday, Republican presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz (TX) said the Obama administration is "responsible" if Americans, Israelis, or Europeans are killed by terrorists supported by Iran.
"The truth is," said Cruz, "if this administration, if President Obama and Hillary Clinton and John Kerry are responsible for sending billions of dollars to Iran, and ... those billions go to jihadists, who use that money to murder Americans, to murder Israelis, to murder Europeans, then the administration is responsible.
CRUZ: I believe this Obama Iranian nuclear deal, is the single gravest national security threat facing America. It is a catastrophic deal. If this deal goes through, several things will happen. First of all, roughly 100 billion dollars, over 100 billion dollars, will flow into Iran. Iran is the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism. That money in turn, billions of it will go on to Hamas, to Hezbollah, to the Houthis. You know, it's very interesting. I pointed out a couple of weeks ago, that if this deal goes through, that the Obama administration will become the world’s leading global financier of radical Islamic terrorism. In response, just last week, President Obama attacked me from Africa for saying that. He said that rhetoric was overheated. Let me tell you…speaking the truth is not rhetoric. The truth is, if this administration, if President Obama and Hillary Clinton and John Kerry are responsible for sending billions of dollars to Iran, and that Iran — those billions go to jihadists, who use that money to murder Americans, to murder Israelis, to murder Europeans, then administration is responsible. Beyond that, this deal leaves four Americans languishing in Iran. … And this deal accelerates Iran acquiring nuclear weapons.
Cruz then outlined his plan for handling the openly anti-American and anti-Israeli Iran and vowed to do everything he can to "mobilize and energize the American people against this catastrophic deal":
CRUZ: I've already introduced legislation in the Senate that would reimpose sanctions, that would strengthen them, and that would lay out a clear path, a sensible path for Iran to lift sanctions, that they would disassemble all 19,000 centrifuges, they would hand over their enriched uranium, they would shut down their ICBM program, which exists for one purpose, and that is to carry a nuclear weapon to the United States of America. And they would cease being the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism. Over the next 60 days, I’m going to do everything I can to mobilize and energize the American people against this catastrophic deal, because I think it is a profound threat to the safety and security of America, and we need a commander-in-chief that will defend this nation.
Last week Cruz was involved in a few public feuds over some "harsh rhetoric" he directed toward President Obama. After saying that the Iran deal would make Obama "the world's leading financier of radical Islamic terrorism," President Obama, Hillary Clinton, and a few others on both sides of the aisle, including Mitt Romney, chided Cruz for being "way over the line." Unfazed by the criticism, Cruz has since doubled down on his statement.
Partial transcript via Breitbart News.
