How the GOP Sabotaged Jimmy Carter’s Re-Election

Former Texas Lieutenant Governor Ben Barnes, compelled by the news of President Jimmy Carter entering hospice care, has told the New York Times that there was, in fact, a secret GOP effort in 1980 to prevent Iran from releasing 53 American hostages until after that year’s presidential election.

Barnes said that in the summer of 1980, he accompanied former Texas governor John Connally, on a trip to the Middle East during which Connally asked Arab leaders to communicate to Iranian officials that they should not release the hostages before Election Day because if they waited, Ronald Reagan would offer them a better deal.