Nuke treaty vote delayed until September
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has postponed a vote on President Obama’s strategic arms treaty with Russia until mid-September, dashing hopes among arms-control advocates that the agreement could be ratified before the fall election season gets into full swing. Committee chairman John Kerry, D-MA, informed members Tuesday that the committee would be rescheduling a business ...
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has postponed a vote on President Obama's strategic arms treaty with Russia until mid-September, dashing hopes among arms-control advocates that the agreement could be ratified before the fall election season gets into full swing.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has postponed a vote on President Obama’s strategic arms treaty with Russia until mid-September, dashing hopes among arms-control advocates that the agreement could be ratified before the fall election season gets into full swing.
Committee chairman John Kerry, D-MA, informed members Tuesday that the committee would be rescheduling a business meeting set for Wednesday, Aug. 4, in which the SFRC was to consider the treaty, known as New START.
Citing members’ requests for more time to review the treaty as well as what he described in a letter as "extensive" background documents provided by the State Department, the intelligence community, and the executive branch, Kerry informed committee members to be ready to vote on the treaty on Sept. 15 or 16 — and urged them to vote yes.
So far, only one Republican member of the committee, ranking member Richard Lugar of Indiana, has signed on, and at least two — Jim DeMint of South Carolina and James Inhofe of Oklahoma — have said they will vote against the treaty.
Kerry likely delayed the business meeting because he isn’t confident the treaty would pass a floor vote.
Josh Rogin covers national security and foreign policy and writes the daily Web column The Cable. His column appears bi-weekly in the print edition of The Washington Post. He can be reached for comments or tips at josh.rogin@foreignpolicy.com.
Previously, Josh covered defense and foreign policy as a staff writer for Congressional Quarterly, writing extensively on Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantánamo Bay, U.S.-Asia relations, defense budgeting and appropriations, and the defense lobbying and contracting industries. Prior to that, he covered military modernization, cyber warfare, space, and missile defense for Federal Computer Week Magazine. He has also served as Pentagon Staff Reporter for the Asahi Shimbun, Japan's leading daily newspaper, in its Washington, D.C., bureau, where he reported on U.S.-Japan relations, Chinese military modernization, the North Korean nuclear crisis, and more.
A graduate of George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs, Josh lived in Yokohama, Japan, and studied at Tokyo's Sophia University. He speaks conversational Japanese and has reported from the region. He has also worked at the House International Relations Committee, the Embassy of Japan, and the Brookings Institution.
Josh's reporting has been featured on CNN, MSNBC, C-Span, CBS, ABC, NPR, WTOP, and several other outlets. He was a 2008-2009 National Press Foundation's Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellow, 2009 military reporting fellow with the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism and the 2011 recipient of the InterAction Award for Excellence in International Reporting. He hails from Philadelphia and lives in Washington, D.C. Twitter: @joshrogin
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