The Iran–Contra affair, often referred to as the Iran–Contra scandal, was a political scandal in the United States that occurred during the second term of the Reagan administration. Between 1981 and 1986, senior administration officials secretly facilitated the illegal sale of arms to Iran, which was subject to an arms embargo at the time. The administration hoped to use the proceeds of the arms sale to fund the Contras, an anti-Sandinista rebel group in Nicaragua. Under the Boland Amendment, further funding of the Contras by legislative appropriations was prohibited by Congress, but the Reagan administration figured out a loophole by secretively using non-appropriated funds instead.
Reagan (far right) meets with (left to right) Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger, Secretary of State George Shultz, Attorney General Ed Meese, and Chief of Staff Donald Regan in the Oval Office
A BGM-71 TOW antitank guided missile
President Reagan (center) receives the Tower Commission Report in the White House Cabinet Room; John Tower is at left and Edmund Muskie is at right, 1987.
North's mugshot, after his arrest
Presidency of Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan's tenure as the 40th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 1981, and ended on January 20, 1989. Reagan, a Republican from California, took office following his landslide victory over Democrat incumbent president Jimmy Carter and independent congressman John B. Anderson in the 1980 presidential election. Four years later, in the 1984 presidential election, he defeated former Democratic vice president Walter Mondale, to win re-election in a larger landslide. Due to U.S. Constitutional law, Reagan was limited to two terms and was succeeded by his vice president, George H. W. Bush, who won the 1988 presidential election. Reagan's 1980 landslide election resulted from a dramatic conservative shift to the right in American politics, including a loss of confidence in liberal, New Deal, and Great Society programs and priorities that had dominated the national agenda since the 1930s.
Presidency of Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan with a cowboy hat at Rancho Del Cielo.
Outgoing President Jimmy Carter and President-elect Ronald Reagan with his wife Nancy in the Oval Office on November 20, 1980
President Reagan and his cabinet in 1981