Battles Abroad & Battles At Home with David Sanger & Devlin Barrett

**Al Hunt** (0:09)
Hey, hello, and welcome to Politics War Room with James Carville and Al Hunt. This week, we're into our New York Times mode, and that's a good mode to be in. We have the Times Chief Washington correspondent, David Sanger on Iran, and Devlin Barrett, the author of The Department of Revenge about the Justice Department. Now remember, we love taking your questions, so write to politicswarroom at gmail.com for next week's show. Now, we're going to get to as many as we can, but don't forget to tell us where you're from. You also can get updates about what's next for Politicon and Politics War Room by signing up at politicon.com. So tell your friends about us and remind them to subscribe on Apple Podcast, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. And please check out the links to our sponsors, Air Doctor, Pears, WL, Mint Mobile, and DeleteMe in our episode show notes. We thank you for supporting these sponsors. It really helps make this podcast happen. Don't forget, by the way, to look in our show notes and look at our Send Them Back survey, which Trump administration officials with the founding fathers have said, send back to England. We want as many votes as we can get in this one.
Hey James, our guest is the fabulous David Sanger, the eminent national security correspondent of The New York Times. He always elevates us and I'm sure he will really elevate us today. He has been following the Saran issue so closely. David, when I read the MOU, I think they got to be ecstatic in Taran. I mean, basically, they potentially get $300 billion of assets or investments sent to them. They have their frozen assets are going to be unfrozen. Now, what did they give up? They gave up, where they are going to open the Straits of Hormuz. That was open up until February 28th and Trump's war, and they are going to pledge not to get a nuclear weapon, which they have been saying all the way back to the Obama deal in 2015

**David Sanger** (2:23)
Yeah. A lot earlier than that, they agreed not to do a nuclear weapon when they ratified the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1970 You were probably writing about it at the time, Al.

**Al Hunt** (2:36)
I was following you, David.

**David Sanger** (2:38)
You forgot about it. I was 10 years old.

**Al Hunt** (2:42)
I know there's still negotiations in the next 60 days. This looks like a pretty good deal for Iran.

**David Sanger** (2:48)
So the oddity of this agreement, first of all, we've all been reading versions of the MOU, but every one of the versions we've been reading is somewhat different. I don't know how many of them you've gotten. I've probably gotten 15 or 20 in my email box.

**Al Hunt** (3:02)
And two or three, and they are a little bit different.

**David Sanger** (3:04)
Yeah, they are different. So number one is we clearly don't all have the final copy yet, or if we do have the final copy, we don't know which one it is. Number two, what kind of operation is that? If you're the administration, you want to solve this problem by publishing what the final deal is. Number three, the president as recently as this morning suggested, well maybe it wasn't final, even though he made it clear it was signed last Sunday. Number four, they're supposed to hold a formal signing in Switzerland, and it's not clear right now that either the vice president or the Iranians, but especially the Iranians, want a picture of them signing this whole thing. For the Iranians, it's signing an agreement with the administration that just killed the supreme leader at the opening of the war. For Vance, whether you want to have a photograph of you signing an agreement with the Iranians that could be used in a future campaign, I don't know James, what do you think?
What's the utility of a photo like that?

**James Carville** (4:19)
Look, it's an instrument of surrender. No one wants to be caught signing an instrument of surrender. That's my view. Right.

**David Sanger** (4:26)
Remember that moment where Mike Pompeo signed the deal that the Trump administration put together in Afghanistan for the withdrawal of US troops? And he was haunted by that photo of him and the Taliban leader for some time. Still is.

**Al Hunt** (4:45)
David, I want to still go, I know it's old. I want to go back to your interview with when Trump called you.
Yeah. You were in London on Sunday. I found it more than a little bizarre. I mean, he said, among other things, don't worry, the Straits of Hormuz will be toll free. But I guess it's still possible that they will not be fee free. I don't know what the distinction is there. At least that's what the Iranians say.