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The University of Maryland's Program on Public Consultation has developed a new way to assess what a representative sample of American voters wants their members of Congress to do about a complex and controversial policy issue, after they are given a briefing and hear arguments from both sides of the debate. These policymaking simulations are vetted for accuracy and balance by Congressional staffers and experts on both sides, so respondents assess whatever participants in the actual Congressional debate consider their strongest arguments for their preferred policy outcome and against one or more policy alternatives.
The Center for International and Security Studies at the Maryland School of Public Policy has partnered with the program to do policymaking simulations at key points during the negotiations and after the Iran deal was announced. In our new study, the 700 registered voters in our "Citizen Cabinet" were briefed on the terms of the deal, then asked to consider a series of critiques and rebuttals. They were also given pro and con arguments for three alternatives to approving the Iran deal: trying to reopen negotiations and get a "better deal"; trying to increase sanctions until the people of Iran demand an end to uranium enrichment; or using military threats and force to stop Iran's worrisome nuclear activities.
Members of our Citizen Cabinet had some serious concerns about any type of nuclear cooperation with Iran, but ultimately 55 percent wanted Congress to approve the deal. Sizeable majorities thought that most of the critiques were at least "somewhat convincing," but nearly as many found the rebuttals convincing. In contrast to simulations conducted during the negotiations, where large majorities of both Democrats and Republicans preferred negotiating an agreement to imposing more sanctions, 77 percent of Democrats now recommend approving the Iran deal and 65 percent of Republicans recommend rejecting it. In earlier simulations, the majority of support for a diplomatic resolution was smallest among independents, but now three in five independents support it (61 percent).
Participants who wanted Congress to reject the nuclear deal could not agree on a better way to address concerns about Iran's nuclear program. Trying to reopen negotiations – the alternative most commonly offered by Congressional critics – was favored by only 14 percent. That group tended to be much more optimistic than everyone else in the Citizen Cabinet about the likelihood that the United States' negotiating partners would be willing to try again after Congress rejected the deal. Likewise, the 23 percent who favored tightening sanctions was more optimistic than the sample as a whole that other countries would agree not to do business with Iran if Congress did not approve the deal. (Eighty-two percent of proponents thought it likely, compared with a majority of the whole sample who thought it unlikely.) Support for the military option was very low (7 percent), and respondents found the arguments against threats and use of force to be much more convincing than those in favor of that option. Seventy-two percent concurred with arguments that this course of action would be "extremely dangerous," while 81 percent doubted that military threats would make Iran more willing to give up its enrichment program and allow anytime/anywhere inspections.
