President Barack Obama should have met sooner with Congressional lawmakers to discuss Iran sanctions, former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates argued Friday.
Gates made his case at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast Friday morning. His comments came a few days after Obama called on Democratic senators to hold off on moving to impose new sanctions on Iran. Obama, in making that case, argued that doing so could imperil nuclear talks with Iran.
“My view is that should have started January 21st, 2009,” Gates said.
Obama made the call during a Tuesday closed-door session with Senate Democrats. Democrats coming out of the meeting stressed that though that Obama indicated that he would sign new sanctions if a nuclear deal fell through.
“If Iran isn’t in the end to make the decisions that are necessary to make it work, he’ll be ready to sign the bill to tighten those sanctions. But we’ve got to give this six months,” Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) said after the meeting.
