U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker has said that the U.S. had been “fleeced” in the course of the nuclear talks with Iran, saying Kerry had “turned Iran from being a pariah, to now Congress being a pariah” in the course of making the agreement, CNN reports.

Corker, a Tennesse Republican, made the remarks on Thursday, as Kerry was testifying publicly before Congress for the first time since world powers reached the landmark accord with Iran on July 14.

Opening the hearing on a contentious note, the committee’s Republican chairman, Bob Corker, criticized Kerry for the terms he negotiated. “I believe that you’ve been fleeced,” he said.

He chided Kerry and other administration officials for contending that the only alternative to the accord would be more war in the Middle East, saying the real alternative would be a better deal.

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