The Assembly of Experts - The Assembly of Experts for the
Leadership (Majles-e Khobragan Rahbari) is Iran’s only
constitutional body with the authority to appoint and dismiss
the supreme leader. - The 86 members are popularly elected every
eight years. But candidates, all Islamic scholars and jurists,
have been vetted to exclude reformers or critics since 1991. -
For all its powers, the assembly has served as a rubber stamp
organization that has never seriously questioned the actions of
either of the two supreme leaders who have led Iran since the
1979 revolution. - The absence of a real check has allowed the
office of leadership, even under Ayatollah Khamenei who began as
a relatively weak political and religious figure, to become
increasingly powerful. The idea for an assembly of experts dates
back to the 1979 Iranian Revolution, when a constituent assembly
was needed to draft a new constitution. Debates over the nature
of that body ultimately led to the formation of a small, expert-
based group rather than