Trump address live updates: President to speak on Iran tonight

Iran’s prime target is Trump, with state media and top officials alike relentlessly mocking and amplifying criticisms of the U.S. leader.

Among the most striking examples: a series of seemingly AI-generated videos depicting Iranian military successes against the U.S. and Israel in a Lego-esque cartoon art style.

The meme war isn’t one-sided: Official U.S. government accounts have shared videos splicing clips from sports, movies and video games into real footage of military strikes since the early days of the war.

Despite criticism, the Trump administration has no intention of changing its strategy. Case in point: Ahead of Trump’s address, White House spokesman Kaelan Dorr posted an AI-generated image featuring a character similar to Gru from the “Despicable Me” films wearing a red MAGA hat, waving a U.S. flag and riding a missile plastered with pro-Trump stickers.

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— Kevin Breuninger

But Trump may be blocked from unilaterally jettisoning the U.S. from NATO thanks to a 2023 bill authored in part by his own Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, then a Republican senator from Florida.

Tucked into the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2024 was a provision blocking the U.S. president from unilaterally exiting NATO, requiring a two-thirds majority in the Senate or an act of Congress for any move to leave the alliance. Rubio led the bill with Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., and it was signed into law in December 2023.

That means any move by Trump to leave NATO would be in immediate legal peril. The alliance was founded in 1949, following World War II.

“The Senate should maintain oversight on whether or not our nation withdraws from NATO. We must ensure we are protecting our national interests and protecting the security of our democratic allies,” Rubio said at the time the bill passed.

Rubio, in a recent interview with Al Jazeera, struck a notably harsher tone toward the alliance.

“If NATO is just about us defending Europe if they’re attacked but then denying us basing rights when we need them, that’s not a very good arrangement. That’s a hard one to stay engaged in and say this is good for the United States. So all of that is going to have to be reexamined,” he said.

— Garrett Downs

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, in a letter Wednesday addressed to the American people, defended his country’s actions in the war against the U.S. and Israel as “legitimate self-defense” while slamming the “delusions of a foreign aggressor.”

“The Iranian people harbor no enmity toward other nations, including the people of America, Europe, or neighboring countries,” Pezeshkian said in the letter, published by Iranian state media ahead of a scheduled address by President Donald Trump.

The leader framed the U.S. for unjust aggression and intervention against Iran spanning decades and argued the current war is damaging America’s “global standing.”

He also accused the U.S. of being a “proxy for Israel” and encouraged Americans to question their government’s claims about Iran.

— Kevin Breuninger