Rubio says Iranian regime must change, praises Trump's ambition in Middle East strikes

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the Iranian regime "has to change," claiming Tehran must abandon its efforts to dominate the Middle East, in a Fox News interview on Saturday. Rubio said US military pressure has left Iran "eager" for deals on denuclearization and the Strait of Hormuz, as Trump halted strikes and said an agreement could be imminent.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the Iranian regime "has to change," claiming that Tehran must abandon its efforts to dominate the Middle East, in an interview with Fox News on Saturday. "You might not have a regime change, but the regime has to change," Rubio said. "They want to export the revolution. That does have to change, and the only way you're going to change that is if you make the price of it too high for them to be able to pay." In the interview with Lara Trump, Rubio discussed the ongoing threat of Iran's nuclear development program, noting that US President Donald Trump remains firm that Iran can never gain nuclear weapons. He also hailed the Trump administration as a power unlike anything Iran has seen in recent decades. "I don't think the Iranian regime has ever faced a president like President Trump, which is someone that actually takes action," the secretary of state said. "They got used to, for 20 or 30 years, not just the US but the broader world allowing them to get away with things like lying, breaking deals, tricking people into agreements, and so forth." Because of Trump's military campaigns in the Middle East, Rubio added, Iran no longer has a conventional missile shield to hide behind. He said that though they are still armed with missile and drone capabilities, the dynamic between the US and Iran has changed drastically. "It's the only reason why they are now willing and in some cases seem eager to do a deal on denuclearization, to do a deal on the straits. Because we're now approaching them from a position of strength, not from a position of weakness," he said. Trump called for a halt to strikes on Iran in a Truth Social post on Saturday night, claiming that a deal with the regime could be imminent. He said he has Israel's support in the decision, which would ideally lead to the complete reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. Lara Trump went on to ask about the Ukraine-Russia War, and Rubio highlighted the US's unique role in efforts to negotiate an end to the conflict. "We're the only country in the world, and President Trump's the only leader in the world, that can bring the Russian side and the Ukrainian side to begin to talk about how you end it," he said. Rubio called out the changing dynamics in the war, including Ukraine's increased military capabilities in recent months and Russia's involvement with Iran. On the latter subject, the secretary of state remained relatively neutral, reducing Russia to an "irritant" as the US continues waves of strikes against Iran. "There is nothing any other country is doing that in any way is standing in the way of us achieving the things we want to achieve or the objectives we want," he added. This comes after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Russia of providing satellite surveillance footage of Gulf states to Iran last Saturday, along with other intelligence and military resources. The interview also addressed the Cuban regime and the threat it poses to the US, including the US ambassador turned Cuban spy. According to Rubio, the former ambassador infiltrated the highest levels of the Defense Intelligence Agency, marking one of the largest-scale intelligence breaches in US history. By the end of the interview, the tone turned much more light-hearted, with Rubio discussing his role as a husband, father, and college football fan.