The Logan Act: it's one of the oldest laws in America and it's authority is rarely exercised, but it's still the law of the land. The Logan Act, which was first enacted in 1799, essentially criminalizes negotiation by unauthorized persons with foreign governments who are currently having a dispute with the United States. If you're a US citizen who meets with a foreign government and you don't disclose details of your interaction, you may have just violated the Logan Act.
Meet John Kerry: the former Secretary of State to President Obama & professional Easter Island statue impersonator who met with Iranian officials on multiple occasions over the past year to discuss Donald Trump's exit from the Nuclear Deal. We're not sure what the legal status is of these meetings, but it doesn't seem like he's having these meetings with President Trump's blessing.
Last week, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo criticized Kerry for "actively undermining" the US Federal government by meetings with Mohammad Javad Zarif, an Iranian diplomat, after Obama and Kerry left office.
Pompeo says Kerry is "unseemly and unprecedented" and "beyond inappropriate."
Kerry isn't denying that he met with Iranian officials. The news first broke back in May and Kerry admitted to the meetings during a radio interview.
Kerry claims he met four times with Iranian officials after he left office, but claims there have been no meetings since Pompeo became Secretary of State in April. These meetings took place in Norway, Germany and at the United Nations headquarters while Rex Tillerson aka T-Rex was still the Secretary of State.
Now Senator (Little) Marco Rubio (R-Fl) is asking the Justice Department to investigate Kerry.
According to Fox News, Rubio said Americans “deserve to know that U.S. laws are enforced regardless of any individual’s past position.”
Rubio thinks it's possible that Kerry violated either the Logan Act or the Foreign Agents Registration Act, which is a similar law passed in 1938 that requires agents representing the interests of foreign powers in a "political or quasi-political capacity" to disclose their relationship with the foreign government and share any information about related activities and finances.
Again, the Logan Act is rarely used. No person has ever been found guilty of violating this law since Congress first passed it in 1799. At the time the law was passed after George Logan participated in unauthorized negotiations with France in 1798 (darn those sneaky French people!). In the entire history of the US, there have only been two people indicted on charges of violating the Act: once in 1802 and the other in 1852, but neither person was convicted.
If Kerry is indicted and charged with the Logan Act, this would be one more historical first for the Trump presidency.
But, even still, is it possible that John Kerry is being unintentionally useful? I know it sounds crazy, but hear me out! Kerry has met many times with Iran and he's clearly sympathetic to their country's economic situation. After Trump reinstated sanctions against Iran, their nation's economy is now crumbling. They're in desperate shape. This is something you rarely hear about in the US, but it's a pretty big deal in the Mideast. Iranians like luxury cars and designer fashion labels; they don't like poverty and economic recessions (but why does?).
Iran's primary resource is oil, a commodity that they aren't selling much of these days thanks to Trump. According to a long list of economic experts, Iran doesn't have much time before their economy is crippled so badly that their entire nation completely falls apart and they're forced to deal with some sort of social revolution. This is theoretical, but it's very possible.
As all of this is happening, John Kerry is playing the role of good cop, while Trump is the bad cop (but in this scenario, the "good cop" is a misguided dolt with no form of authority and the "bad cop" is the most influential political leader on Earth).
John Kerry keeps telling Iran they can wait out Trump and his sanctions because soon the US President will be impeached and replaced with a leader who is eager to work with their country. Of course, Kerry also said Trump would never be elected in the first place and he's very likely been telling Iran, just as his party has told everyone else, that Trump's presidency isn't legitimate. They keep talking about Trump leaving office but, the last time I checked, Trump is still sitting in the Oval Office.
In recent years John Kerry and his political allies have been wrong with their predictions over and over again. Despite their far fetched claims that Hillary would be POTUS, Trump won the 2016 election and, despite the assurances of so many Democrats to their constituents, he hasn't been impeached because there's still no proof of Russian collusion, the economy is soaring in the US and, for the most part, most American voters are satisfied with how things are going.
But Iran isn't doing as well as their enemies in the States and they're running out of time. Their only friend in the US, John Kerry, is batting 0.0 on American political predictions.
Eventually, Iran will probably cave in and fold to the US. I'm not being optimistic, I'm being realistic. I'm not saying this as someone who's a big fan of economic sanctions (or tariffs, or embargoes). Iran needs help and they need it soon. So while Trump and Kerry continue to play good cop, bad cop with Iran, it's becoming increasingly obvious that Iran won't find success by following Kerry's advice. And that's when Trump will again (and again)
NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 26: U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry (L) and Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad-Javad Zarif (R) attend a meeting of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council plus Germany about Iran's nuclear program on September 26, 2013 in New York City. (Photo by Thomas Koehler/Photothek via Getty Images)