ArchPundit

He voted against the State of Illinois divesting pension funds for Iran with the argument while voting for divestiture from Sudan:

“I don’t believe that state government ought to be getting involved in foreign policy,” Schock told me later.

He also said his local police and fire pension boards told him that a previous bill banning pension investments in Sudan had required them to unload good investments in large, well-known companies.

“With each additional restriction that’s placed on a pension fund in Illinois, it further prohibits those pension managers’ ability to make wise decisions, to keep those pension systems solvent,” Schock said.

The final version of the Iran bill applies only to the five state pension systems, not local police and fire pension systems.

Though he said the General Assembly shouldn’t delve in foreign policy, Schock said that doesn’t mean he would vote against all resolutions in that field.

“Ultimately, you have to make a decision based on what you’re presented with,” he said. “But I don’t think it’s wise for us to get involved with foreign policy, as a rule of thumb.”

This is all very baffling because US law has far stricter rules on doing business with Iran–US Companies cannot (well, except that Halliburton company that violated the law under Dick Cheney) do business with Iran and even international businesses are limited with how much business they can do with Iran and operate in the United States. Divestiture would be far easier in the case of Iran than Sudan, and as Bernie points out, the Iranian bill only applied to five statewide pension funds. So, perhaps this is one of those things he pulled out of his pocket.

Via Rich,  Bill, and Yellow Dog