Midday Roundup: Dear Tehran, here's how U.S. government works

Civics lesson. Republican lawmakers created a stir yesterday when they released an open letter to Iran’s leaders, giving them a lesson in U.S. government. In the letter, 47 senators reminded Iran that U.S. President Barack Obama doesn’t have the authority to sign a permanent nuclear deal without congressional approval. Under the proposed deal, Iran would put its nuclear program on hold for 10 years in return for an end to sanctions that are crippling its economy. Republicans warned Iran the next U.S. president could revoke the deal without backing from the legislative branch. Iran’s foreign minster dismissed the letter as “a propaganda ploy,” but the Obama administration was livid. “In 36 years in the United States Senate, I cannot recall another instance in which senators wrote directly to advise another country—much less a longtime foreign adversary—that the president does not have the constitutional authority to reach a meaningful understanding with them,” Vice President Joe Biden said in a statement.

Attack recorded. Jurors in the Boston Marathon bombing trial watched video footage today that showed Dzhokhar Tsarnaev standing near the finish line before and shortly after the explosions. In part of the footage from a surveillance camera, Tsarnaev can be seen placing a backpack behind a row of children, including 8-year-old Martin Richard, who died in the attack. Investigators later determined the bag contained a pressure cooker bomb. The trial began last week with testimony from witnesses and victims, many of whom lost limbs in the blast. Defense attorneys did not cross-examine any of them but did put questions to an investigator who took the stand to read pro-jihad tweets attributed to Tsarnaev. His attorneys suggested Tsarnaev was more interested in typical teenage pursuits, including girls, than in the Islamic extremism adopted by his older brother, Tamerlan.

Expelled. The president of the University of Oklahoma has expelled two students who reportedly led members of fraternity Sigma Alpha Epsilon in a racist chant caught on tape. President David Boren did not name the students but said he decided to kick them off campus for creating a “hostile learning environment for others.” Boren said he hoped the expulsions would help other students realize “it is wrong to use words to hurt, threaten, and exclude other people.” But legal expert Eugene Volokh, writing in The Washington Post, questioned the legality of Boren’s decision. Although abhorrent, racist speech is protected by the First Amendment, Volokh said, citing U.S. Supreme Court precedent when it comes to campus speech.

Sporting loss. Three French athletes were among 10 people who died in a helicopter crash in Argentina yesterday. Olympic swimmer Camille Muffat, yachtswoman Florence Arthaud, and boxer Alexis Vastine were contestants in a reality television show that leaves people in the wilderness and challenges them to find their way back to civilization. Investigators say they don’t know what caused the two helicopters carrying the contestants to crash into each other. The flying conditions were “ideal,” one expert said. Muffat, 25, won a gold for 400 meters freestyle at the 2012 London Olympics. Vastine, 28, won bronze at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Arthaud, 57, was known for daring voyages, one of which in 1990 set a record for the fastest solitary crossing of the Atlantic Ocean.

Miracle rescue. Four first responders who pulled an 18-month-old baby from a car partially submerged in an icy Utah river said they heard an adult voice calling to them for help. The car had plunged off an embankment, landing upside down in the water, and the rescue crew couldn’t see inside. When they rolled the car over, they discovered the driver, 25-year-old Lynn Jennifer Groesbeck, was already dead. But her baby, Lily, was still alive. None of them can explain the voice they say they heard. “It felt like I could hear someone telling me, ‘I need help,’” Officer Bryan DeWitt told CNN affiliate KSL. “It was very surreal, something that I felt like I could hear.” Police think the accident happened at about 10:30 p.m. Friday night. A fisherman discovered the car shortly after noon on Saturday. Lily is recovering, and her family describes her progress as astounding. She’s awake, smiling and laughing with family members. “We’re blown away by Lily’s progress and so grateful to her rescuers,” the family said in a statement.

Remembered. Claude Sitton, a New York Times reporter who made his mark covering the Civil Rights movement, died today. He was 89. In 1964, Newsweek praised Sitton as “the best daily newspaperman on the Southern scene.” His stories had a reputation for being fair and detail-driven. “He got where no one else was. It was hustle, and a determination to see it with his own eyes,” Hank Klibanoff, who teaches journalism at Emory University told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.