At least one Republican 2028 presidential hopeful — Senator Ted Cruz of Texas — is laying the success or failure of the Iranian peace deal at the feet of Vice-President JD Vance, the administration’s top peacenik and isolationist.
“History demonstrates giving billions of dollars to theocratic lunatics who want to kill you is an exceptionally bad idea,” Cruz said, after another Republican Senator, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, proclaimed Vance to be the “architect” of the memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed yesterday by President Trump in the Palace at Versailles, France.
Trump himself is also getting in on the game. “If it [the deal] works out, I’m going to take the credit. If it doesn’t work out, I’m blaming JD,” he told the world yesterday. “You better be careful, JD!”
Indeed, JD is now on a TV campaign defending the deal against critics, foreign and domestic. “The idea that he is going to strike a deal that’s bad for the American people, it’s preposterous,” Vance told reporters today.
As for the reported widespread criticism of the deal in Israel, the vice-president said, “If I was in the cabinet of the Israeli government, I might not be attacking the only powerful ally that I have anywhere left in the entire world.”
Trump is now sending Vance to Geneva, or wherever talks take place, to begin negotiations on the remaining, unresolved issues in the MOU, namely, the disposition of Iran’s nuclear materials.
Is Trump eyeing payback for Vance’s role in shaping the MOU by sending him to take the fall if the deal turns sour?
Gee, would our president do such a thing?
POSTSCRIPT: I guess JD wanted no part of taking the fall for a deal gone sour. I just saw a headline on TV that said: “Vance No Longer Traveling to Geneva.”
