Democratic Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia called the actions of Republican senators who sent a letter to the Iranian government "dangerous territory," and unlike anything in United States diplomatic history.
The letter, sent on Monday, warned the Iranian government to think twice about entering into a deal regarding its nuclear program with President Obama, who the senators noted has a limited term in office.
"I don't think in American diplomatic history we've ever seen anything like this. It would have been like, you know, some of the folks who opposed the Iraq War, if they would've written a letter to Saddam Hussein. I think we are getting into quite honestly dangerous territory," the Democratic senator said on the John Fredericks Show earlier in the week.
The senator added he didn't think the American people would support a military option unless diplomacy was tried first.
"I thought the prime minister of Israel, Bibi's speech last week was a powerful speech, but in many ways he said 'you can't trust Iran' and I don't disagree with that. You know, 'don't do this deal,' but then he said 'go get a better deal' and sitting on the intel committee, hearing everything, the strength of our sanctions is our ability to maintain all of the international community keeping sanctions on. I think we have to—you know—I don't think the American people are ready to say, alright, we are immediately going to go to military action or potentially war, if we don't at least try diplomacy first. I think we have to take the military option on the table but I think this is a very dangerous precedent. I was disappointed that so many, you know, Republicans find that the senator who led this effort, Senator Cotton, at least he's been forthright because he said his whole goal was to make sure there's no deal."
Warner said it would have been "equally inappropriate" for Democrats to send a letter against President Bush.
"It think it would be equally inappropriate if a group of Democrats sent a letter against President Bush. I mean this—at some point America's strength has been for most our history, you know, that we can argue about foreign policy but particularly when we present ourselves to other governments, we present a united force."