Biden’s Bad Deal: Paying Iran a $6 Billion Ransom for American Hostages Turns “the American Passport into a Bullseye”

Last week, the Biden Administration announced it had reached a deal with the Iranian regime to begin the release process of five American hostages.  In return for the hostages being placed under house arrest, the Administration committed to releasing $6 billion in frozen assets held in South Korea, which it claims will only be accessible for humanitarian purposes.  We should all be happy for the families of these five individuals and thankful that they are finally receiving good news about their loved ones. I know that as Secretary of State, nothing was more rewarding than bringing home Americans held hostage in foreign countries.  Unfortunately, given the details of the deal, I fear that it will only make Americans less safe in the long run.

After the Biden Administration swapped Viktor Bout for Brittney Griner earlier this year, I wrote that while our goal should always be to bring every American home, we must also negotiate in a way that ensures we don’t incentivize the taking of hostages in the future.  I’m afraid that the Biden Administration has repeated its mistake.

First, regardless of the amount being released to the Iranian regime, there is no chance this money is ultimately going to be used for humanitarian purposes.  Team Biden knows this because money is fungible.  That means that even if every cent released to the regime is in fact used for humanitarian purposes – an improbable outcome in itself – the regime will still be free to allocate more resources to fund terror and mayhem on America’s partners and allies.  The Obama-Biden Administration made a similar argument when it funneled massive amounts of taxpayer dollars to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which ended up doing little more than supporting the rise of Hamas in Gaza and, eventually, the West Bank.  It made the same case, too, when it committed America to the original Iran deal in 2016, sending pallets of American cash to the Ayatollah in an exchange that also involved the release of American hostages.  Tehran simply waited for the familiar faces of the Obama JV team to return in the Biden Administration and ran the same playbook over again.

History has shown that giving terrorist regimes resources is foolish and results in bad outcomes for Americans. That’s why when I was Secretary of State, we cut off funding to the UNRWA and put a historic sanctions program in place to cripple the Iranian regime.  We were able to do this and still bring home two American hostages, Xiyue Wang and Michael White, without spending a dime.

Instead of building on this approach, the Biden Administration chose to make a $6 billion ransom payment.  This will not only greatly increase Iran’s ability to fund future acts of terror, but also encourage the taking of more hostages in the future.  By swapping $6 billion for five Americans, the Iranian regime now knows the going price for an American hostage is $1.2 billion, and so do the rest of our adversaries.  After Biden’s decision to give Viktor Bout – the “Merchant of Death” – back to Putin in order to bring Brittney Griner home, I wrote that the Administration had turned the American passport into a bullseye.  I fear this bullseye just got even bigger after this flawed deal.

What President Biden seems to misunderstand is that the goal of hostage negotiations is not simply to bring Americans home, no matter the cost; it is also to protect Americans in the future.  For this reason, our leaders should always be crystal clear about the consequences of holding an American hostage, even when negotiating to bring them home.  This was the model we followed in the Trump Administration: When Pastor Andrew Brunson was being held in Turkey, we introduced tariffs and sanctions until the Turkish government relented and allowed him to come home.  But the Biden Administration has done the opposite – it has rewarded the Iranian regime for holding Americans hostage; and in doing so, it has sent a message to our enemies that there is real profit in going after American citizens.  The Biden Administration should have negotiated a better deal.  Instead, it paid a ransom.