During an event at the White House Thursday afternoon, President Trump ripped former Secretary of State John Kerry for his continuing shadow dealings with Iran.
"With Iran, I'd like to see them call me. You know, John Kerry speaks to them a lot. John Kerry tells them not to call. That's a violation of the Logan Act. And frankly, he should be prosecuted on that. But my people don't want to do anything. only the Democrats do that kind of stuff you know? If it were the opposite way, they'd prosecute him under the Logan Act," Trump said. "But John Kerry violated the Logan Act. He's talking to Iran and has been, has many meetings and many phone calls. And he's telling them what to do. That is a total violation of the Logan Act, because what they should be doing is their economy is a mess ever since I took away the Iran deal. They have inflation that's the highest number I've ever heard. They are having riots every weekend and during the week even."
Trump stressed Iran must come to the table in order to make a deal as their economy continues to fall apart.
"What they should be doing is calling me up, sitting down. We can make a deal, a fair deal. We just don't want them to have nuclear weapons, not too much to ask. And we would help put them back into great shape. They're in bad shape right now. I look forward to the day where we can actually help Iran. We're not looking to hurt Iran. I want them to be strong and great and have a great economy," he said. "But they're listening to John Kerry, who violated a very important element of what he's supposed to be doing. He violated the Logan Act, plain and simple. He shouldn't be doing that. But they should call, and if they do, we're open to talking to them. We have no secrets. And they can be very, very strong financially. They have great potential."
Kerry regularly meets with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammed Zarif and has urged him to "wait out" the Trump presidency.
John Kerry was asked point blank in September 2018 whether he was telling Iran to wait out President Trump. He did not deny it.@DanaPerino: "Is that accurate?”@JohnKerry: "Well, I think everybody in the world is sitting around talking about waiting out President Trump." pic.twitter.com/ThrNLWKjb9
— Matt Wolking (@MattWolking) May 9, 2019
Earlier this week, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made a surprise trip to Baghdad after the Department of Defense confirmed credible threats of attack against American interests. Wednesday marked the one year anniversary of the United States pulling out of the flawed Iran nuclear agreement. Iran has threatened to restart their nuclear program unless European countries still in the deal refuse to renegotiate parts of the deal. The regime is also refusing to fully comply with portions of the agreement.
“Iran did not fall into this trap”
— TicToc by Bloomberg (@tictoc) May 8, 2019
Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani says Tehran isn't completely withdrawing from the 2015 nuclear deal although they are scaling back on some parts of it. More on @business: https://t.co/sG1OaHOcxg pic.twitter.com/3iHZ79bes5
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