Negotiating with Terrorists
August 29, 2016 Weekly Columns
It has been a longstanding policy of the United States that we will not negotiate with terrorists and we will not pay ransom money to free hostages. The reasons for this policy are obvious; paying ransoms incentivizes the taking of more hostages. U.S. presidents for decades have recognized this policy and adhered to it - until this president.

As we have learned over the last several weeks, the Obama administration paid Iran $400 million in pallets of foreign currency – supposedly to pay them back for an arms deal in the late 1970’s that the United States had negotiated with the Shah of Iran when they were considered a friendly ally. Not surprisingly, when the Shah was overthrown and the Islamic Revolutionaries took over the country and seized 52 American hostages, that arms deal was negated and diplomatic relations between our two countries were severed.

Former President Barack Obama didn’t give “150 billion in cash” to Iran.

The nuclear agreement included China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom, the United States and the European Union, so Obama didn’t carry out any part of it on his own. The deal did lift some sanctions, which lifted a freeze on Iran’s assets that were held largely in foreign, not U.S., banks. And, to be clear, the money that was unfrozen belonged to Iran. It had only been made inaccessible by sanctions aimed at crippling the country’s nuclear program.