{"id":202359,"date":"2026-03-04T12:38:15","date_gmt":"2026-03-04T12:38:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/trump-news-at-a-glance-rubio-and-his-boss-cant-seem-to-agree-on-why-us-attacked-iran-the-guardian\/"},"modified":"2026-03-04T12:38:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-04T12:38:15","slug":"trump-news-at-a-glance-rubio-and-his-boss-cant-seem-to-agree-on-why-us-attacked-iran-the-guardian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/trump-news-at-a-glance-rubio-and-his-boss-cant-seem-to-agree-on-why-us-attacked-iran-the-guardian\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump news at a glance: Rubio and his boss can\u2019t seem to agree on why US attacked Iran – The Guardian"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rubio said the US was reacting after learning that Israel planned to strike Iran, but Trump on Wednesday contradicted that explanation \u2013 key US politics stories from Tuesday 3 March at a glance
Donald Trump<\/a> attempted to counter a simmering anti-Israel backlash in Congress and among his own Maga supporters on Tuesday by denying suggestions that he had been bounced into attacking Iran because Israel had already decided to do so.
Amid growing criticism from opponents and allies, Trump rebuffed claims that he had struck Iran only because Israel had forced his hand, a suspicion fueled by comments made<\/a> by the secretary of state, Marco Rubio<\/a>.
Asked whether Israel<\/a> had pushed him into launching military action, Trump told reporters: \u201cNo. I might have forced their hand. We were having negotiations with these lunatics, and it was my opinion that they were going to attack first. They were going to attack. If we didn\u2019t do it, they were going to attack first. I felt strongly about that.\u201d
Senate Democrats reacted furiously after Rubio suggested on a visit to Capitol Hill that Saturday\u2019s strikes were driven by the need to pre-empt Iranian retaliation against US interests in response to Israeli attacks that Washington knew was coming.
Trump has provided fluid reasoning for why he ordered attacks last Saturday, in concert with Israeli strikes, one of which killed Iran\u2019s most powerful figure, the supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
He has also sent mixed signals about whether he is willing to deploy US forces in a \u201cboots on the ground\u201d capacity, a decision that would almost certainly further inflame domestic criticism.
Trump has provided fluid reasoning for why he ordered attacks last Saturday, in concert with Israeli strikes, one of which killed Iran\u2019s most powerful figure, the supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. He has also sent mixed signals about whether he is willing to deploy US forces in a \u201cboots on the ground\u201d capacity, a decision that would almost certainly further inflame domestic criticism.
Read the full story<\/sub><\/a>
Iranian drones hit the US embassy in Riyadh as Tehran continued to launch waves of retaliatory strikes at the Gulf and Israel, while Israeli soldiers began operating in southern Lebanon<\/a> on the fourth day of an increasingly regional war in the Middle East.
The drone attack on the US embassy in Riyadh caused a minor fire, prompting the diplomatic mission to tell Americans to distance themselves from the compound. The attack followed an earlier Iranian drone strike on the US embassy in Kuwait, as Iran<\/a> continued to target US bases, facilities and personnel in Arab Gulf states.
Read the full story<\/sub><\/a>
US military<\/a> commanders have been invoking extremist Christian rhetoric about biblical \u201cend times\u201d to justify involvement in the Iran war to troops, according to complaints made to a watchdog group. In one complaint to the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, viewed by the Guardian, the complainant said that their commander had \u201curged us to tell our troops that this was \u2018all part of God\u2019s divine plan\u2019 and he specifically referenced numerous citations out of the Book of Revelation referring to Armageddon and the imminent return of Jesus Christ\u201d.
Read the full story<\/sub><\/a>
A North Carolina<\/a> congressional primary on Tuesday is an early test of datacenter politics \u2013 a fight increasingly shaping elections nationwide.
In the Durham-area fourth district, Congresswoman Valerie Foushee is seeking her third term against progressive challenger Nida Allam, a Durham county commissioner she defeated in 2022.
Read the full story<\/sub><\/a>
The first votes of the 2026 midterm cycle will be cast on Tuesday, with a pair of high-stakes US Senate primaries in Texas<\/a> that will test both parties\u2019 appetite for political change in the Trump era.
Read the full story<\/sub><\/a>
Donald Trump has criticised Keir Starmer<\/a> again over the UK\u2019s refusal to aid the offensive strikes on Iran, saying the \u201crelationship is obviously not what it was\u201d.
The British PM had issued his strongest rebuke yet of Trump\u2019s action in Iran<\/a>, saying the UK did not believe in \u201cregime change from the skies\u201d and defended his decision not to allow the use of British bases to conduct the strikes.
Read the full story<\/sub><\/a>
Nancy Mace, a Republican representative, is under investigation by the House ethics committee<\/a><\/strong> over allegations that she may have improperly claimed more than $9,000 in reimbursements meant to subsidize housing costs for members of Congress.
The secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Kristi Noem<\/a>, on Tuesday would not retract her statements calling the two US citizens who were killed by immigration enforcement officers in Minneapolis earlier this year \u201cdomestic terrorists\u201d<\/a><\/strong>, while also claiming that agents do not abide by quotas for arrests.
Howard Lutnick, Donald Trump<\/a>\u2019s commerce secretary, has agreed to appear voluntarily before the House committee on oversight and government reform<\/a><\/strong> as part of its investigation into Jeffrey Epstein<\/a>\u2019s criminal network, the committee\u2019s chair announced on Tuesday.
OpenAI is amending its hastily arranged deal to supply artificial intelligence to the US Department of War (DoW)<\/a><\/strong> after the ChatGPT owner\u2019s chief executive admitted it looked \u201copportunistic and sloppy\u201d.
The US justice department abruptly reversed course on Tuesday<\/a><\/strong> and decided it would defend executive orders made by Donald Trump<\/a> to try to penalize law firms that represented clients or causes the president did not like.
A Minnesota state prosecutor announced an investigation Monday that may lead to charges against federal officers<\/a><\/strong>, including Greg Bovino, for misconduct during an immigration enforcement crackdown.
Catching up? Here\u2019s what happened Monday 2 March<\/a><\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n

source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rubio said the US was reacting after learning that Israel planned to strike Iran, but Trump on Wednesday contradicted that explanation \u2013 key US politics stories from Tuesday 3 March at a glanceDonald Trump attempted to counter a simmering anti-Israel backlash in Congress and among his own Maga supporters on Tuesday by denying suggestions that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":202360,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-202359","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-us","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/202359","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=202359"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/202359\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/202360"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=202359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=202359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=202359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}