The Obama administration's Iran deal might as well be referred to as the "jihadist stimulus bill," according to Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, who appeared on Fox News' "The Kelly File" Wednesday night to discuss what he believes will be the implications of what is being called a historic nuclear accord.
"This deal ensures that Iran, either number one, will acquire nuclear weapons, or number two, will necessitate military action from the United States or Israel," Cruz explained to host Megyn Kelly.
"In addition to that, if this deal goes through, and I hope that Congress steps up and stops it, billions of dollars will flow from the United States of America to Iran, the leading state sponsor of terrorism in the world," Cruz, a 2016 presidential contender, continued. "That money will be spent by jihadist terrorists to murder Americans, to murder Israelis, to murder Europeans. If this deal goes through, the Obama administration will become the leading financier of terrorism against America in the world."
"I've heard this referred to before as the jihadist stimulus bill," Cruz said.
National Security adviser Susan Rice admitted Wednesday that it is entirely possible for Iran to take some of the $150 billion it receives from sanctions relief and direct it towards terrorism, The Daily Caller reported.
"Once they start getting that money are there any restrictions on how the Iranians can use that money? Obviously they can use it to build schools and highways, but they could use it to support international terrorism, right?" CNN's Wolf Blitzer asked Rice on Wednesday.
Rice responded: "It is real, it is possible, and, in fact, we should expect that some portion of that money would go to the Iranian military and could potentially be used for the kinds of bad behavior that we have seen in the region up until now."
The deal that has so many lawmakers worried was signed between Iran and the P5+1 world powers on Tuesday. Iran agreed to abide by significant restrictions on its nuclear program to prevent it from developing an atomic weapon in exchange for the removal of international and U.S. sanctions.
Rice said she believes Iran will, "for the most part," spend the unfrozen money on the "Iranian people and their economy which has tanked."
"But the goal here, Wolf, was never, and was not designed to prevent them from engaging in bad behavior in region," Rice explained. "They're doing that today. The goal is to ensure that they don't have a nuclear weapon, and therefore, when they are engaging in that bad behavior, are that much more dangerous."
