Obama nears victory on Iran deal vote

OREANDA-NEWS. September 02, 2015. President Barack Obama has moved to within one vote of the 34 he needs in the US Senate to ensure Congress does not scuttle the nuclear deal with Iran.

With the Republican-controlled Congress scheduled to vote by 17 September on a resolution of disapproval of the nuclear accord, senators Bob Casey (D-Pennsylvania) and Chris Coons (D-Delaware) today became the 32nd and 33rd senators pledging to support the deal.

The 34th vote is crucial because if Congress were to vote to reject the deal, Obama would then almost certainly veto and would need 34 senators in his camp to sustain the veto.

Senate Foreign Relations Committee ranking Democrat Ben Cardin (D-Maryland) predicted today that Obama will have the votes he needs to sustain a veto by the end of the week. Cardin has not said whether he will support the deal.

To override a presidential veto, lawmakers must muster a two-thirds vote in both houses of Congress.

Proponents of the deal are hoping they might even be able to get the 41 votes needed to filibuster the resolution of disapproval, saving Obama from the embarrassment of having his efforts to reach a nuclear deal with Iran rejected by Congress.

Casey called the agreement "the best option available to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon," while Coons said the alternative, if Congress were to kill a deal, "is a scenario of uncertainty and isolation."

The agreement the US and its P5+1 negotiating partners, the UK, France, Germany, Russia and China, reached with Iran on 14 July would swap nuclear concessions for oil and petrochemical sanctions relief.

During the long negotiations to reach an accord, Iran's oil exports have been limited to 1mn-1.1mn b/d, down from 2.5mn b/d before the sanctions were imposed in 2012. Six countries — China, India, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Turkey — have continued to buy oil from Iran.

Iran produced 2.88mn b/d in July, up from 2.85mn b/d in June, making it Opec's third largest oil producer. Iranian officials have said repeatedly their oil sector needs \\$150bn-\\$200bn in new investment. US officials estimate that sanctions have cost Iran more than \\$160bn in oil revenue since 2012.