Democratic Politician Leading Effort to Open Business Ties With Iran

A failed Democratic U.S. Senate candidate is reinventing himself as the face of U.S.-Iranian commerce, traveling to Tehran with a group of American business leaders and promoting investment ahead of a potential nuclear deal that could lift sanctions against the regime.

Ned Lamont, the anti-war businessman who lost to former Senator Joe Lieberman (I., Conn.) in 2006, visited Iran with a delegation of U.S. executives last month and has been raving about the country’s fertile business environment to various news outlets.

“The Australians are there [doing business], the Brits, the Germans. It’s like Rick’s Cafe. Everybody was there except for the Americans,” Lamont told the Washington Free Beacon. “The hotel [in Tehran] is a hotbed of deal-making.”

The April 11 trip was sponsored by the President Action Network chapter of the World Presidents’ Organization, a global invite-only group of executives over the age of 50. PAN has also brought U.S. business leaders to North Korea and Cuba in recent years.

The delegation was led by PAN cofounder Bobby Sager—a Boston philanthropist who has counted Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad and Rwanda despot Paul Kagame as close friends—and Cyrus Razzaghi, an Iranian-based consultant whose client roster includes numerous Iranian government agencies.

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