My understanding is that $400 million was Iranian money that was tied up in a frozen US trust fund stemming from a 1979 negotiation. An international tribunal claims court didn't reach a decision for decades, so we essentially settled instead of paying the $10+ billion we could have paid when you consider interest and value at the time of 1979.

And the hostages couldn't be released until the money reached Iran... that's called a bribe and a coverup



It was the previous administration's money. The same people don't rule Iran anymore. It was all a front to coverup the bribe

This post was edited by EndlessSky on Oct 18 2018 06:37pm

Maybe. But if that tribunal court reaches a decision...we could have been on the hook for much more. 10 billion range. We basically settled. It was their money.

It was the prior administration's money. Democrats aren't afraid of rewriting history, they do it everyday.

no they were actively opposed to Pres Obama then. McConnell blatantly said so in 2010 and on. I doubt anyone with a sense of reality would argue otherwise. Couple key differences:

(R)s held certain political power during those years (in math terms, not reeeeee terms). As dull and boring as their strategy was, it was in line with legislative power of yeah we aint doing anything (other than the pathetic omnibus no thanks to Paul Ryno - good riddance)

(R)s as despicable as they can be did not run with some out of nowhere theory based on unsubstantiated leaked emails that Merrick Garland was a gang-rape leading satanic harbinger of evil when he was nominated for the SC. They simply said “yeah nope we will wait till after the election per the Biden rule”. Again boring and dull and blatantly partisan, but a correct flexing of political power without really going into the gutter.

This post was edited by excellence on Oct 18 2018 06:45pm

The money belonged to the people, do you think the American government gives all their money back every time the other party gets in?

Its actually the American people's money br0

what should also not be forgotten is how risky the republican strategy surrounding this scotus seat was. had clinton won the election, she could have feigned discomfort with Garland and replaced him with a substantially more liberal judge. would have been a total and complete dick move against Garland, but the math for the GOP went something like this: 70% chance that clinton wins, 30% chance that trump wins. conditional on clinton winning, lets say there is 50% chance that she goes for an even more liberal judge instead of garland.

so there was a 30% chance of successfully stealing a supreme court seat, a 35% chance of ending up with garland anyway, and a 35% chance of ending up with someone who's quite a bit worse than garland from the GOP pov. considering that the GOP establishment didnt trust trump at the time they had to make a decision on their garland strategy, and that most pundits and predictions saw trumps chances of winning far below 30% for the entirety of this race, the expected (probability-weighted) political return of this strategy was most likely negative for the GOP. it was reaaaaally daring and risky, but paid off in the end. props to McConnell for the balls and instinct to pull this off.

It was paid in effect to release hostages. Their release was contingent on it being paid.

As for ownership and tribunals, the United States isn't under any obligation to respect that. International law is anarchy.