Gov. Greg Abbott said the Lone Star State will continue to prohibit public investment in that country even if the Iran deal goes through, and urged Texas’ congressional delegation Tuesday to vote against President Barack Obama’s nuclear agreement with Iran and, websites reported Tuesday, September 1st.
A vote on the nuclear weapons deal is expected in Washington in late September. Texas’ Republicans oppose the deal, and Democrats generally say they have not yet decided how they will vote.
Abbott’s letter came as Obama was reported to be just one vote short of enough to uphold a veto of a Republican-backed resolution to block the agreement.
“Entering into an agreement with a country that consistently calls for ’death to America’ and expecting them to live up to this deal is not only short-sighted, it is turning a blind eye to geopolitical realities,” Abbott said in his letter to delegation members. “I call upon the Texas Congressional delegation to reject President Obama’s deal with Iran and uphold states’ rights to prohibit investment that would benefit Iran.”
Abbott said that if the deal is approved by Congress, Texas will continue its efforts to prohibit public investment in Iran. Current Texas law bans taxpayer-funded investment in Iran and with entities that do business with Iran, a prohibition that has affected oil deals for years.
“The retirement funds of Texas state employees and teachers will not be complicit in the financing of terrorism across the globe,” Abbott wrote. “If the unfortunate occurs, and this deal passes, I will also be calling on private enterprises across our state to join in refusing to aid a hostile Iranian regime.”
In his letter, Abbott said that in addition to compromising U.S. national security, “this deal will threaten our country’s greatest ally in the Middle East: Israel.”