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Marco Rubio says US 'preemptively' attacked Iran after learning Israel planned to strike
Marco Rubio said the United States’s aim is to destroy Iran’s ballistic missile capabilities, and that it attacked Iran “preemptively” on Saturday to protect US forces from retaliation after learning that Israel was going to strike.
The secretary of state’s remarks came as he answered questions from reporters before briefing congressional leaders on the US-Israel strikes on Iran this weekend.
The US secretary of state said: “There absolutely was an imminent threat. And the imminent threat was, that we knew that if Iran was attacked, and we believed that they would be attacked, that they would immediately come after us. And we were not going to sit there and absorb a blow before we responded.”
He added: “We knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties.”
Six US service members have been killed since Saturday.
Later, Rubio said that the United States’s mission in Iran “is the destruction of their ballistic missile capabilities, and their ability to manufacture them, as well as the threat posed by their navy to global shipping,” but that “we would not be heartbroken, and we hope that the Iranian people can overthrow this government”.
In response to a question about reports that the United States hit an Iranian girls’ school, Rubio said “the United States would not deliberately target a school” but referred questions about the hit to the Department of Defense.
“The hardest hits are yet to come from the US military,” Rubio concluded, before heading into the briefing.
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Chris Stein
The Senate’s Democratic minority leader Chuck Schumer said a briefing from Trump administration officials about the US war with Iran “raised many more questions than it answered.”
“Look, a whole lot of questions were asked. I found their answers completely and totally insufficient,” Schumer told reporters as he exited the meeting. He departed without taking questions.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio as well as CIA director John Ratcliffe are among those briefing Congress leaders in a classified facility in the Capitol. We expect other participants to come out and share their thoughts soon.
In a social media post today, Donald Trump said “Iran would have had a Nuclear Weapon three years ago” if he didn’t “terminate Obama’s horrendous Iran Nuclear Deal”.
Ex-president Barack Obama negotiated the nuclear deal with Iran, which was implemented in 2016. Before leaving office, the Obama White House issued a statement, which did not mention Trump by name, but read: “The United States must remember that this agreement was the result of years of work,” and “represents an agreement between the world’s major powers – not simply the United States and Iran.”
As my colleague Martin Pengelly reported in 2017:
Trump has not been as outright hawkish on the deal as other leading Republicans, saying he could seek to renegotiate it instead of tearing it up entirely. Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee, the Republican chair of the Senate foreign relations committee who Trump considered for secretary of state, said this month the deal would have to be strictly enforced, not scrapped.
Nonetheless, figures including Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu have expressed hope that Trump will abandon the deal, an eventuality a former head of the Atomic Energy Agency said would be a “disastrous”.
The US state department is urging Americans to “depart now” from more than a dozen Middle Eastern countries, following the US-Israel strikes on Iran.
In a post on social media, the assistant secretary for Consular Affairs advised Americans to leave Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, the West Bank, Gaza, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen “due to serious safety risks”.
Hundreds of thousands of travelers are currently stranded in the Gulf states, as the airspace over some of the world’s busiest airports, such as Dubai and Abu Dhabi, closed over the weekend.
Warren presses Rubio over alleged first amendment violations in Gaza protest crackdown
Shrai Popat
Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren has questioned the Trump administration’s justification to try to remove several student activists who were living and studying in the US on valid visas and green cards.
In a letter written to secretary of state Marco Rubio, and first provided to the Guardian, Warren notes that these students – Mahmoud Khalil, Rumeysa Ozturk, Mohsen Mahdawi, Badar Khan Suri and Yunseo Chung – appear to have been targeted for their political views, “potentially violating their first amendment rights … despite the fact that none of these students were accused of a crime at the time or have been to date.”
All of these students became flashpoints of the administration’s crackdown on protests against Israel’s war in Gaza.
Warren said that “recently unsealed court documents” also show that the state department and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) assessed the students’ speech, written materials, and participation in protests around the war in Gaza, and that Rubio “personally approved their arrest and the revocation of their visas in the United States”.
Signed by Warren, and fourteen other Democratic members of Congress – including senators Chris Van Hollen, Ed Markey and Jeff Merkley and representatives Ayanna Pressley, Greg Casar, Rashida Tlaib and Summer Lee – the lawmakers write they there are “particularly concerned” about the use of Section 237 of the Immigration and ity Act (INA) to justify the removal of several student activists from the US. This is a rare provision that allows deportation if a person’s presence has “serious adverse foreign policy consequences”. The letter notes that this authority had almost never been used in this way before.
The lawmakers also write that Rubio justified the removals of these students by citing a national foreign policy objective of “combatting antisemitism”, while on social media labeling some of the students as supporting terrorists.
They also note internal assessments from the state department which found no evidence to support the administration’s claims “for deportation based on support to a foreign terrorist organization” for any of the five students.
For example, the letter notes a department memo which found that federal immigration enforcement did not provide any evidence showing that Rumeysa Ozturk, a graduate student at Tufts University who authored an op-ed in her student newspaper that resulted in her being detained in a Louisiana detention center for six weeks, engaged in “any antisemitic activity or made any public statements indicating support for a terrorist organization or antisemitism generally”.
The letter concludes with a list of formal questions for Rubio to answer by 16 March 2026. These include a historical record of how often these specific deportation powers have been used by a secretary of state since 1990; a request for the number of deportation determinations for individuals whose presence in the country “compromises a compelling United States foreign policy interest”; and documentation of any policy changes made under Section 237 since January 2025.
“In attempting to deport these five students, a court ruled that you took actions ‘to chill the rights to freedom of speech and peacefully to assemble’ of students and academics across the country,” Warren wrote. “This abuse of your authority risks normalizing a future where Secretaries of State may summarily revoke visas based on speech, depriving individuals of their rights and whittling down the guarantees of the First Amendment.”
California governor Gavin Newsom denounced Donald Trump for spending “more time talking about his ballroom” than the US servicemembers who died in this weekend’s attack on Iran, while speaking at an event today.
Newsom also said “energy prices are up across the globe” and called the war “unfunded” as Trump’s administration is “cutting food stamps” and other social supports amid an “affordability” crisis.
Fran Lawther
The US embassy in Amman, Jordan was temporarily evacuated on Monday due to a threat, it said in a statement. The embassy did not elaborate on the nature of the threat.
In a security alert posted on X, embassy staff wrote:
Out of an abundance of caution, all personnel at the U.S. Embassy have temporarily departed the Embassy compound due to a threat.
Chris Stein
Secretary of State Marco Rubio and CIA director John Ratcliffe are set this afternoon to brief leaders of Congress as well as the chairs of several committees about the US war with Iran.
As he headed into the behind-closed-doors meeting in the Capitol, Democratic Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer made a brief comment to reporters: “This is Trump’s war. This is a war of choice. He has no strategy, he has no end game.”
He declined to take questions.
Republican speaker of the House Mike Johnson entered the meeting shortly after him.
Marco Rubio says US 'preemptively' attacked Iran after learning Israel planned to strike
Marco Rubio said the United States’s aim is to destroy Iran’s ballistic missile capabilities, and that it attacked Iran “preemptively” on Saturday to protect US forces from retaliation after learning that Israel was going to strike.
The secretary of state’s remarks came as he answered questions from reporters before briefing congressional leaders on the US-Israel strikes on Iran this weekend.
The US secretary of state said: “There absolutely was an imminent threat. And the imminent threat was, that we knew that if Iran was attacked, and we believed that they would be attacked, that they would immediately come after us. And we were not going to sit there and absorb a blow before we responded.”
He added: “We knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties.”
Six US service members have been killed since Saturday.
Later, Rubio said that the United States’s mission in Iran “is the destruction of their ballistic missile capabilities, and their ability to manufacture them, as well as the threat posed by their navy to global shipping,” but that “we would not be heartbroken, and we hope that the Iranian people can overthrow this government”.
In response to a question about reports that the United States hit an Iranian girls’ school, Rubio said “the United States would not deliberately target a school” but referred questions about the hit to the Department of Defense.
“The hardest hits are yet to come from the US military,” Rubio concluded, before heading into the briefing.
US military says six service members killed in Iran conflict
In a statement, US Central Command (Centcom) said that six service members have been killed in action.
“US forces recently recovered the remains of two previously unaccounted for service members from a facility that was struck during Iran’s initial attacks in the region,” Centcom said. “ The identities of the fallen are being withheld until 24 hours after next of kin notification.”
House oversight committee releases videos of Clintons' depositions on Epstein investigation
The House oversight committee has just released the video footage of Bill and Hillary Clinton’s depositions, as part of lawmakers’ ongoing investigation into Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell.
The former president and former secretary of state sat individually for closed-door testimony last week before the committee.
The developments on the US-Israel war in Iran risks overshadowing the release of the footage, particularly as top administration officials brief congressional leaders on Operation Epic Fury. Secretary of state Marco Rubio just spoke to members of the press ahead of his meeting with lawmakers.
In a somewhat vague statement before the UN security council, Melania Trump offered her “heartfelt condolences to the families who have lost their heroes who sacrifice their lives for freedom”, without naming a specific conflict, or the US-Israel war on Iran.
She added:
I extend my earnest wishes for a swift and smooth recovery to all those who have been injured. You are in my thoughts and prayers during these challenging times, the US stands with all of the children throughout the world. I hope soon peace will be yours.
Here's a recap of the day so far
In his first conference since the joint US-Israel operation against Iran, Donald Trump laid out his administration’s objectives moving forward. This includes destroying Iran’s missile capabilities, annihilating their navy, preventing Iran from ever having nuclear weapons, and ensuring the country “cannot continue to arm, fund and direct terrorist armies outside their borders”. Notably, the president did not urge the Iranian people to push back against their government – something he’s pushed for in recent weeks.
Speaking today, Trump said that he predicted the war to last four-five weeks but the US has the “capability to go far longer”. In an earlier interview the president also didn’t rule out the possibility of American boots on the ground in Iran. “I don’t have the yips with respect to boots on the ground – like every president says ‘there will be no boots on the ground.’ I don’t say it,” the president told the New York Post. “I say ‘probably don’t need them,’ [or] ‘if they were necessary.’”
Earlier, in a heated Penatgon press conference, Pete Hegseth initially said that US troops wouldn’t be in Iran, but later said he wouldn’t get into details. “We’re not going to go into the exercise of what we will or will not do,” he said, while chiding reporters for asking for more clarity on the length of the US-Israel war on Iran. “We have plans,” he said. “But we would never in front of a press pool lay out how long that may take.” He also pushed back against Democratic lawmakers and the media at large. “This is not Iraq. This is not endless. I was there for both. Our generation knows better, and so does this president,” Hegseth said.
US Central Command also confirmed that a fourth US service member has been killed. A joint statement by Gulf states and the US condemned Iran’s “indiscriminate and reckless missile and drone attacks” across the Middle East and warned that the strikes threatened regional stability.
Kuwait air defences mistakenly shot down three US F-15 fighter jets flying in Iran-related operations, the US Central Command (Centcom) said on Monday. All six crew members ejected safely, were safely recovered and in stable condition.
Also today, secretary of state Marco Rubio, defense secretary Pete Hegseth, CIA director John Ratcliffe, and Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff – will brief senior congressional lawmakers on Operation Epic Fury. On Tuesday, top administration officials will address all members of the House and Senate for a Congress-wide briefing.
First lady Melania Trump has arrived in New York, where she will chair a UN security council (UNSC) meeting today. She’s presiding over a summit about education for children living through conflict. This comes as the US-Israel continue their ongoing military action against Iran.
Joining the growing chorus of commentators on the right who question the military action in Iran is Marjorie Taylor Greene – the former Georgia congresswoman who used to be a loyal foot soldier for Donald Trump before breaking with the president last year over several issues (most notably the Jeffrey Epstein files).
“And just like that we are no longer a nation divided by left and right,” Greene said. “We are now a nation divided be those who want to fight wars for Israel and those who just want peace and to be able to afford their bills and health insurance.”
The top Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee –Mark Warner – said that Donald Trump “has ordered military strikes against seven nations since the beginning of his second term” in a post on X. Despite campaigning on a platform to no longer implicate the US in foreign conflicts, Donald Trump’s administration has launched strikes on several countries since he returned to the White House last year, including Iran, Venezuela, Somalia and Yemen.
“Is he still claiming to be the president of peace?” Warner wrote. The Virginia lawmaker is one of the eight members of Congress set to receive a briefing on Operation Epic Fury from top administration officials at 4pm ET.
'Killing terrorists is good for America': White House says 49 senior Iranian leaders killed in Operation Epic Fury
Press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that “49 of the most senior Iranian regime leaders” have been killed during the Operation Epic Fury so far. This includes supreme leader Ali Khamenei.
“Preventing this radical regime and its terrorist leaders from threatening America and our core national security interests is a clear-eyed and necessary objective,” she wrote in a post on X.
Lucy Campbell
Nato secretary-general Mark Rutte on Monday praised US and Israeli military action against Iran, saying it was degrading Tehran’s ability to get its hands on nuclear and ballistic missile capability, but he said Nato itself would not be involved.
“It’s really important what the US is doing here, together with Israel, because it is taking out, degrading the capacity of Iran to get its hands on nuclear capability, the ballistic missile capability,” he told Germany’s ARD television in Brussels.
“There are absolutely no plans whatever for Nato to get dragged into this or being part of it, other than individual allies doing what they can to enable what the Americans are doing together with Israel,” he added. Rutte offered similar praise about the operation during a Fox News interview today too.
