The top foreign affairs Democrats in Congress on Tuesday asked the State Department for a briefing about efforts to extend — or not extend — the New START arms control treaty that limits U.S. and Russian long-range nuclear weapons.
House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) and Senate Foreign Relations Committee Ranking Member Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) were especially concerned that there “is no Senate-confirmed senior leaders at the State Department with responsibility over nuclear negotiations,” according to a letter the two published online. The lawmakers noted the recent resignation of Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Andrea Thompson.
The two asked for a briefing on the White House’s New START strategy “as soon as possible and on an ongoing basis.”
New START limits deployed U.S. and Russais strategic nuclear weapons — essentially, those with more destructive power than required for use on a battlefield — to 1,550 warheads deployed across across 700 intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarine-launched ballistic missiles, and heavy bombers. In addition, each state may possess no more than 800 deployed and nondeployed bombers, intercontinental ballistic missiles, and submarine-launched ballistic missiles launchers.
The treaty went into effect in 2011 and expires in February 2021, but it can be extended for five years.
The Donald Trump administration has said it prefers creating a trilateral nuclear arms control treaty with Russia and China to extending New START. The Chinese government has said it will not join such a treaty. Russia has said it is open to extending New START.
Over the summer, a bicameral group of Democratic lawmakers, including Engel and Senate Armed Services Committee Ranking Member Jack Reed (D-R.I.), urged the Trump administration to extend New START before attempting to negotiate new or broader arms control deals.
