While the Department of Energy announced a nuclear agreement was reached and signed by the United States and Saudi Arabia, President Donald Trump said on social media the agreement “will be approved” but hasn’t yet.
DOE said July 22 that U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright and Saudi Minister of Energy Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman signed a “peaceful nuclear cooperation agreement, commonly known as a 123 agreement, alongside an accompanying bilateral safeguards agreement.”
A day after DOE’s release, Trump took to his Truth Social account to say the “Civil Nuclear Deal… will be approved.” However, Trump added the deal is contingent on Saudi Arabia joining the U.S.-brokered Abraham Accords.
A 123 agreement, otherwise called the “gold standard” nuclear agreement, is a legal framework named after section 123 of the Atomic Energy Act. It calls for peaceful nuclear cooperation between the U.S. and another country, requiring a commitment to nuclear nonproliferation between both parties in order for the United States to export nuclear material, according to the State Department.
The 2020 Abraham Accords is a series of agreements establishing security ties between Israel and a few Arab nations. Saudi Arabia has long rejected normalizing diplomatic ties with Israel through the Accords until a credible pathway for independent Palestinian statehood is manifested.
The deal with Saudi Arabia has been a controversial one among Democrats dating back to at least March. Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) expressed concerns that Saudi Arabia potentially had reservations about the normal “gold standard” protocols, mainly inspection of nuclear sites and the absence of reprocessing and enrichment. Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) expressed similar concerns in an interview with Exchange Monitor.
Balancing non-proliferation concerns with the desire to help a friendly nation with nuclear power, has come up in Senate hearings dating back to at least 2023.
“Rest assured, these agreements uphold the highest standards of nuclear safety and nonproliferation, while relying on the world’s best nuclear technology and scientists, designed right here in the United States,” Wright said in DOE’s press release last week.
Trump also said in his Truth Social post that there “will be no enrichment of material!” He added that the “United States is not opposed to Civil (Non-Enriched) Nuclear Facilities.”
The agreement still has to go through Congress for review.