1. United States
2. Maine
3. Letter

This Is a National Security Issue, Not a Dealmaking Exercise I am writing to urge you to insist that any U.S. negotiation team handling Iran and broader Middle East security include people with real, deep expertise in the region, nuclear diplomacy, military risk, and Iranian decision-making. These talks are not a real estate transaction, or an investment pitch. They involve war and peace, nuclear escalation, economic security, and the safety of the United States and its allies. The current approach appears dangerously thin on substance and heavy on political loyalty. That is not a responsible basis for negotiations of this magnitude. The prior round already showed the cost of sending envoys who lacked the technical background and regional knowledge needed to understand Iranian positions accurately. Congress should not allow that mistake to be repeated. It is especially troubling that Jared Kushner remains associated with these efforts despite the obvious ethical concerns surrounding his private financial interests and Middle East business ties. When private enrichment and public policy sit too close together, the result is not strategy — it is suspicion. This is not “the art of the deal.” It is a high-stakes national security matter involving Iran’s nuclear ambitions, regional instability, military consequences, and the risk of catastrophic miscalculation. If Congress is serious about oversight, it should demand a negotiating team built from actual experts, not well-connected non-specialists.  Rather than relying on unserious, political demands doomed to fail, such experts would understand, in a way the current negotiating team simply cannot, what can realistically be achieved, and what is reasonable to give up.    In particular… There were no fees before this war, and there is no moral basis for creating them now. The United States should not use a conflict it initiated as an excuse to demand payments from businesses or nations that the U.S. was never entitled to collect. I urge you to press for immediate changes to the composition of the negotiating team and to require regular briefings on who is representing the United States, what qualifications they have, and how conflicts of interest are being prevented.