Scammer
Banned
Vice president Joe Biden says START is "a fundamental part of our relationship with Russia"
Washington -- Top Democratic lawmakers will join Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Wednesday morning for a news conference to discuss the need for the Senate to approve a nuclear treaty with Russia before the end of the year.
On Tuesday, a key Republican senator cast doubt on the Obama administration's chances of passing the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) during the lame-duck session of Congress.
Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona, who is taking the lead for Republicans on negotiating with the administration on ratification of the treaty), said in a statement he told Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, that the accord should not be considered before January, when the newly elected Congress is seated.
"When Majority Leader Harry Reid asked me if I thought the treaty could be considered in the lame-duck session, I replied I did not think so given the combination of other work Congress must do and the complex and unresolved issues related to START and modernization," Kyl said.
Alarmed Democrats were quick to respond, arguing that it would be dangerous to delay consideration of the treaty.
Vice President Joe Biden released a statement warning that "failure to pass the [new treaty] this year would endanger our national security. Without ratification of this treaty, we will have no Americans on the ground to inspect Russia's nuclear activities, no verification regime to track Russia's strategic nuclear arsenal, less cooperation between the two nations that account for 90 percent of the world's nuclear weapons, and no verified nuclear reductions."
Biden called the treaty "a fundamental part of our relationship with Russia, which has been critical to our ability to supply our troops in Afghanistan and to impose and enforce strong sanctions on the Iranian government."
The vice president said the administration will continue to seek Senate approval of the treaty before the end of the year.
The White House said it has been working to allay Kyl's concern, even sending three administration officials to meet with him last week and offering an additional $4.1 billion for modernization of the weapons program.
Still, despite the outreach, the White House only learned of Kyl's opposition to taking up the vote during the lame-duck session "via the press," a senior administration official said.
State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley also weighed in, saying that "we believe that we've answered all of their questions. We've addressed ... concerns that Sen. Kyl and others have expressed about ensuring that there is an effective modernization program as a companion to the New START treaty."
Crowley promised that the administration will continue to engage Kyl and others "in good faith."
The White House is offering to spend $4 billion more over five years for nuclear weapons modernization, in an effort to win over Kyl and other holdout Republicans who have questioned whether the Obama administration will provide enough money for modernization of the nuclear force remaining after the proposed START cuts the number of deployed warheads to 1,550.
