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For the most part, this sounds like the main advantage of withdrawing from the treaty was to make a point (apart from point c in your final paragraph)? Not meaning to be snarky, just wondering if I inferred correctly.
Sure, though there's a bit more to it. It's a content neutral argument- it doesn't only matter if the [insert agreement] was a good idea, it also matters how it was went about. Process matters, and American Presidents who ignore process requirements deserve to get their noses rubbed into it, but there are broader benefits as well.
Short-term utilitarianism (the effects of JCPOA are good, therefore we should ignore process to keep it) is a bad governing and international diplomacy model over time, and thus the best way to negate such bad models is to make them survive or die by their own standard. Americans should not make commitments they are not prepared- or able- to keep, and one of those checks is if they have bipartisan support. Policies that will not survive a transition of party, should not be the policy of the united states, and future presidents should remember JCPOA as a cautionary tale of how not to try and establish a legacy policy.
This is particularly true if we want a more restrained American foreign policy aparatus in the future (i.e. in a more multipolar world), where the American executive's limitations are as much as asset as a hinderance. When other parties know that American Presidents have limitations in what they offer, it increases the need for a party to get their agreement in writing through Congress (after which American courts can later overrule different administrations). This, in turn, requires clearly identifiable- and communicable- benefits to the American Congress, and thus electorate, as to why the American commitment should be made.
If the other party is not willing to make such a commitment- or cannot convince the American electorate as to why an American commitment is appropriate- this is a strong argument against the US executive making a commitment themselves and thus exposing the US to future conflicts that they American political base will not support. Since that would see the US abandon the policy regardless- and thus lose legitimacy / credibility / prestige / whatever form of favor you prefer- it is in many cases more important for Presidents to not make bad deals/commitments than it is for them to be able to make any deal they want.
I'd add that failing to negotiate the JCPOA as an Article II treaty also has implications regarding its effectiveness; properly following processes actually has an impact on how seriously the party you're negotiating with takes the agreement. Foreign leaders are very aware of the political capital necessary to acquire a two-thirds Senate majority, which makes it highly unlikely that the U.S. will renege on the engagement. The President’s predecessors are less likely to back out when support is high; legislators are less likely to pass laws inconsistent with the treaty, putting the U.S. in breach; and foreign heads of state are less likely to resist execution or withdraw knowing that the President, the legislature, their predecessors, and the American people stand behind the agreement. There is a reason why these kind of significant nonproliferation agreements have traditionally been negotiated as treaties: these kinds of matters deserve focus and commitment.
In the absence of this, why in the world would Iran take the agreement seriously whatsoever given that there had never been a demonstration of American commitment to it? Keep in mind too that Iran is a country with a long history of secretly exceeding limitations placed on its nuclear program. The JCPOA was negotiated in the first place because of Iran flouting multiple legally binding UNSCRs for a period of years and blatantly violating its Safeguards Agreement; they were willing to lose billions of dollars in sanctions to continue pursuing nuclear weapons in secret. Without the necessary two-thirds majority, the JCPOA was effectively a non-binding statement of intent; it was a gentlemen's agreement without much force behind it, one which involved a hefty frontloaded benefit to Iran (if adhered to) while basically just asking for Iran's word that it would not violate the rules of international law - something it already had been doing surreptitiously for years on end prior to the JCPOA. Such a weighty and fraught agreement at least deserved to be a treaty, and circumventing the mechanisms meant to ensure consensus was a failure on the Obama administration's part.
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