Obama To Senate: Ratify Nuke Treaty
Politico reports:
President Obama told Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Sunday that he’ll push the Senate in coming weeks to ratify a nuclear arms treaty the two leaders signed earlier this year.
“I reiterated my commitment to get the START treaty done during the lame duck session, ” Obama said after meeting with Medvedev. “And I’ve communicated to Congress that it is a top priority.”
But the treaty, which Obama and Medvedev signed in April in Prague, has run into Republican opposition. Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), the minority whip, is leading a bloc of GOP senators who are withholding their support in exchange for concessions from Obama on modernizing the U.S. nuclear arsenal. Obama needs Republican support for the two-thirds Senate vote necessary to ratify the treaty, which would reduce the United States and Russia’s nuclear arsenals by about one-third
If Obama can’t get the treaty through the lame duck session, ratification would be left to a new Senate with fewer Democrats and more Republicans likely to oppose the treaty.
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