CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins and Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) (YouTube Screengrab)
CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins took Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) to task over his support of President Donald Trump’s widely panned Memorandum of Understanding, forcing him to defend several of the plan's more outrageous points.
“My point of view is that we have to give peace a chance to get done,” Moreno told Collins. “We have absolutely not made Iran stronger. We've killed almost 80 of their top leaders. We've destroyed their army, their navy, their ballistic missile program. Like I said, they are absolutely in a dramatically worse position as a result of president Trump's actions. And he prevented them from actually using a nuclear weapon that they could have cobbled together.”
“[But] this deal lets them have waivers,” Collins pointed out. “They can start selling oil tonight. Eventually it will potentially unfreeze billions of dollars, hundreds of billions of dollars in frozen assets. Iran is still a state sponsor of terrorism, according to the United States. Do you have an issue with the U.S. doing things that allows them to have money to potentially rebuild all of those things that you just mentioned?”
“What's the alternative, Kaitlan?" Moreno demanded. "What would you want the president to do? Allow them to have built a nuclear weapon?”
“That's a question for some Republicans, too, it sounds like,” said Collins, referring to many GOP critics who find the deal offensive. She also pointed out that Iran now stands “make more money because they're selling it at competitive market prices to buyers with more attractive currencies.”
She also reminded Moreno that he said in April that money from Iran’s oil sales doesn't “go to the people. It goes to a corrupt leadership.”
“Aren't you worried that corrupt leadership is now going to get tens of billions of dollars from these sales?” she asked.
“Yeah, but we'll be watching exactly what they do with the money,” said Moreno.
“But the president pledged not to get involved in their domestic affairs in the MOU that he signed,” Collins quickly countered, to which Moreno could only repeat: “We're going to make certain that they behave, and they do exactly what they need to do.”
Moreno then made a comparison to Trump’s intervention in Venezuela, saying Trump “saved Latin America,” and promised “you’re gonna see that happen in Cuba.”
“It’s not the same thing. You can’t really compare the two,” said Collins, before then asking Moreno about the plight of the Iranian people.
“[Trump] told that Iranian people that this was their chance to rise up and take back their government. Their government is being run by the former leader’s son. Do you think that they have been left hung out to dry here?”
“Look, I don't know what's going to happen there,” said Moreno. “Again. We don't know.”