The Trump administration is calling on Iran to give up its entire nuclear program or face the consequences, National Security Advisor Mike Waltz said Sunday.

Waltz said it was time for Iran to ‘walk away completely’ from its pursuit of nuclear weapons, pushing for a ‘full dismantlement’ during an appearance on CBS’ ‘Face the Nation.’

‘This isn’t some kind of, you know, kind of tit-for-tat that we had under the Obama administration or Biden,’ Waltz said. ‘This is the full program. Give it up or there will be consequences.’

Waltz did not specify what kind of consequences Iran could face, though he said President Donald Trump is keeping ‘all options on the table,’ including diplomacy.

Waltz said the Trump administration wants Iran to give up its nuclear program ‘in a way that the entire world can see.’

‘If [Iran] had nuclear weapons, the entire Middle East would explode in an arms race,’ he said. ‘That is completely unacceptable to our national security. I won’t get into what the back-and-forth has been, but Iran is in the worst place it has been from its own national security since 1979.’

Tensions between Tehran and Washington have been high since Iran’s proxies, Hamas and Hezbollah, launched attacks on Israel in the past few years. Iran directly traded fire with Israel twice last year.

Trump has threatened U.S. military action if Iran doesn’t negotiate a new agreement on its nuclear program.

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has said he isn’t interested in talks with a ‘bullying government,’ though Iranian diplomats, including Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, previously suggested that talks could be possible. Araghchi later toughened his stance, following Khamenei’s lead.

The original 2015 nuclear deal negotiated under former President Barack Obama allowed Iran to enrich uranium up to only 3.67% purity and to maintain a uranium stockpile of 661 pounds. The International Atomic Energy Agency’s last report on Iran’s program put its stockpile at 18,286 pounds as it enriches a fraction of it to 60% purity.

U.S. intelligence agencies assess that Iran has yet to begin a weapons program, but has ‘undertaken activities that better position it to produce a nuclear device, if it chooses to do so.’

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

President Donald Trump’s envoy to Russia and Ukraine says he doesn’t believe Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to invade Europe.

Envoy Steve Witkoff made the statement during a Sunday morning appearance on ‘Fox News Sunday,’ commenting on Putin’s motives on a ‘larger scale.’

‘Now I’ve been asked my opinion about what President Putin’s motives are on a larger scale. And I simply have said that I just don’t see that he wants to take all of Europe,’ Witkoff said.

‘This is a much different situation than it was in World War II. There was no NATO,’ he added. ‘I take him at his word in this sense.’

The comments come just before Witkoff is set to meet with Russian and Ukrainian delegations for indirect ceasefire talks in Saudia Arabia. Trump’s administration hopes to mediate a larger peace deal.

‘I think you’re going to see in Saudi Arabia on Monday some real progress, particularly as it affects a Black Sea ceasefire on ships between both countries. And from that you’ll naturally gravitate to a full-on shooting ceasefire,’ he said Sunday.

Moscow spokesman Dmitry Peskov emphasized that there are many roadblocks that could prevent a peace deal, however.

‘We are only at the beginning of this path,’ he told reporters this weekend.

Russia launched a massive drone attack targeting Kyiv and other major cities in Ukraine overnight on Sunday, highlighting just how far there is to go before a peace agreement can be made.

Ukraine’s air force says the Russian attack involved 147 drones, 97 of which were shot down and 25 others failed to reach their targets.

Ukrainians at the scene of the attacks in Kyiv surveyed the damage done to their homes and neighborhoods on Sunday morning. Many were disparaging of the upcoming ceasefire talks, pointing to the burned-out homes destroyed in the drone attack, saying these were more indicative of Russia’s true intentions.

President Donald Trump has issued an endorsement in Wisconsin’s upcoming state Supreme Court race, as the formally bipartisan contest draws mega-donor dollars over its potential national implications.

Trump threw his support behind conservative Brad Schimel, the former Wisconsin Attorney General who is currently a Waukesha County judge. Republicans have warned that Schimel’s opponent, Dane County’s Susan Crawford, a liberal considered the Democrats’ preferred candidate, could support efforts to ‘draw out’ two U.S. House Republicans in future redistricting maps. 

‘In the Great State of Wisconsin, a Radical Left Democrat, one who is insistent on bringing hardened CRIMINALS, that we removed to far away places, back into our Country, allowing men into women’s sports, Open Borders, and more, is running against a strong, Common Sense Republican, JUST CALL HIM BRAD, for the Wisconsin Supreme Court,’ Trump wrote on TRUTH Social on Sunday.

‘It’s a really big and important race, and could have much to do with the future of our Country. Get out and VOTE, NOW, for the Republican Candidate — BRAD!!!’ Trump said. 

It’s not the first time Trump has voiced support for Schimel. The Wisconsin Supreme Court election is scheduled for April 1, but Trump called supporters to turn out Saturday, as early voting had already begun. 

‘Brad Schimel is running against Radical Left Liberal Susan Crawford, who has repeatedly given child molesters, rapists, women beaters, and domestic abusers ‘light’ sentences,’ Trump wrote Saturday on his social media platform. ‘She is the handpicked voice of the Leftists who are out to destroy your State, and our Country — And if she wins, the Movement to restore our Nation will bypass Wisconsin. All Voters who believe in Common Sense should GET OUT TO VOTE EARLY for Brad Schimel.’

‘By turning out and VOTING EARLY, you will be helping to Uphold the Rule of Law, Protect our Incredible Police, Secure our Beloved Constitution, Safeguard our Inalienable Rights, and PRESERVE LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL,’ Trump said. 

Democrats and Republicans have traded barbs on billionaires’ influence in the election. George Soros, the far-left Hungarian American billionaire, poured $1 million into Wisconsin Democrats’ coffers last month to benefit Crawford’s campaign. Tech entrepreneur Elon Musk, who is leading the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), has funded two groups that have together spent more than $10 million to promote Schimel, according to the Associated Press. 

Both sides have been boosted by additional mega-money. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker – whose family owns Hyatt Hotels – dumped $500,000 into WisDems coffers, and other six-figure pitches came from Lynde Uihlein – a Schlitz Beer heiress – LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and the mother of a Google co-founder. Meanwhile, Joe Ricketts – co-owner of the Chicago Cubs and father of Nebraska’s GOP governor – was listed as a top donor to Wisconsin Republicans ahead of the election – as well as Liz Uihlein, a cousin-by-marriage of Lynde Uihlein and president of Uline shipping supply company. 

Donald Trump Jr. notably held an event for Schimel last week. 

Republicans are branding Crawford as ‘dangerously liberal,’ citing support from Soros, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, as well as activist groups who support gender-transition surgeries for minors and allowing biological men to compete in women’s sports.

A source familiar with the race warned of Crawford’s candidacy as part of an ongoing ‘radical’ shift in Wisconsin – both with liberal Justice Janet Protasiewicz’ similarly contentious election in 2023 and Gov. Tony Evers’ move to replace ‘mother’ in the state budget dozens of times with ‘inseminated person.’

Republicans also accuse Crawford of signaling a willingness to ‘legislate from the bench,’ citing her past role in challenging the state’s voter ID law and her appearance at a January event hosted by a liberal donor group aiming to unseat Reps. Bryan Steil of Janesville and Derrick Van Orden of Prairie du Chien.

In January, Wisconsin Republicans also claimed that Crawford would seek ‘selling two of Wisconsin seats’ after a New York Times report cited donors hoping that Crawford’s win would lead to Steil’s and Van Orden’s ouster.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Peace talks between U.S. and Russian delegations aimed at ending the war in Ukraine are underway Monday in Saudi Arabia, according to media reports. 

The discussions come after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said a delegation from his country had a ‘quite useful’ meeting with an American team in Riyadh on Sunday. 

‘Our team is working in a fully constructive manner, and the discussion is quite useful. The work of delegations continues. But no matter what we’re discussing with our partners right now, Putin must be pushed to issue a real order to stop the strikes – because the one who brought this war must be the one to take it back,’ Zelenskyy said. 

The U.S. delegation meeting with the Russians on Monday is led by Andrew Peek, a senior director at the White House National Security Council, and Michael Anton, the director of the policy planning staff at the State Department, Reuters reported. It added that the Russians are represented by Grigory Karasin, the leader of the Russian upper house of parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee, and Sergei Beseda, an adviser to the director of Russia’s Federal Security Service. 

The delegations will focus on a ceasefire in the Black Sea, according to a report by Russia’s state-run TASS news agency, citing U.S. National Security Advisor Mike Waltz. In the next stage of the talks, the two sides will discuss ‘issues related to the verification of the ceasefire, the peacekeeping contingent, as well as the ownership of territories.’ 

President Donald Trump’s Special Envoy Steve Witkoff told Fox News he doesn’t believe Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to invade Europe. 

‘Now I’ve been asked my opinion about what President Putin’s motives are on a larger scale. And I simply have said that I just don’t see that he wants to take all of Europe,’ Witkoff said during an appearance on ‘Fox News Sunday.’

‘This is a much different situation than it was in World War II. There was no NATO,’ he added. ‘I take him at his word in this sense.’

‘I think you’re going to see in Saudi Arabia on Monday some real progress, particularly as it affects a Black Sea ceasefire on ships between both countries. And from that you’ll naturally gravitate to a full-on shooting ceasefire,’ Witkoff also said Sunday. 

Russia launched a massive drone attack targeting Kyiv and other major cities in Ukraine overnight on Sunday, highlighting just how far there is to go before a peace agreement can be made. 

Fox News’ Anders Hagstrom contributed to this report. 

The Senate Republican campaign committee is calling on GOP senators to showcase the mission of President Donald Trump and his billionaire ally Elon Musk to ‘eliminate wasteful spending’ by the federal government.

In a memo shared first with Fox News on Monday, the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) is urging senators to spotlight that Trump’s recently created Department of Government Efficiency, better known by its acronym DOGE, is pushing to ‘streamline federal operations, eliminate wasteful spending, and reduce the size of the bloated federal bureaucracy.’

The memo points to recent national surveys, including the latest Fox News poll, that indicate majority support by Americans to tackle federal waste and fraud and downsize the government.

But those same surveys also point to the public’s dissatisfaction with how DOGE is carrying out its mission, including major cuts to the federal government workforce. And the polls indicate that Americans hold an unfavorable view of Musk, the world’s richest person and the chief executive of Tesla and SpaceX, whom Trump picked to steer DOGE.

DOGE has swept through federal agencies during the first two months of the Trump administration, rooting out what the White House argues was billions in wasteful federal spending. Additionally, it has taken a meat cleaver to the federal workforce, resulting in a massive downsizing of employees. The moves by DOGE grabbed tons of national attention and have triggered a slew of lawsuits in response.

The Democratic National Committee as well as congressional Democrats have repeatedly targeted both DOGE and Musk.

‘Trump’s Firing Spree Devastates Veterans, Children with Disabilities – and His Own Supporters,’ the subject line of a recent DNC email to supporters claimed.

But the NRSC, pointing to the polls which indicate the popularity of the DOGE mission, calls on GOP senators to ‘drive the message that President Trump and Senate Republicans are undoing the Biden-Harris spending that drove inflation and higher costs of living.’

The NRSC also emphasizes that senators and their communications staff should highlight the ‘overall popularity of cutting wasteful spending’ and offer ‘numerous examples of egregious waste, fraud, and abuse throughout the federal government.’

The NRSC also calls on senators and their staff to ‘work with Musk, the DOGE team, and Cabinet secretaries to identify any mistakes, request quick action, and communicate as one team.’

And Senate Republican communications staff are urged to ‘make suggestions about potential cuts publicly and privately. Be a leader on cuts your Senator is passionate about through regional and new media.’

Looking ahead to next year’s midterm elections, when the GOP aims to expand its 53-47 majority in the chamber, the NRSC emphasizes that ‘Senate Republicans have one job: lock arms with the White House, amplify this fight, and ride this wave to victory in 2026.’

And the NRSC warns that ‘the alternative – fracture, waffling, silence – cedes trust, voters, and the narrative to Democrats.’

Forty years after President Ronald Reagan first conceived the idea, defense industry leaders say the technology is finally advanced enough to build an invisible protective dome of space-based radars, missile interceptors and laser weapons over the United States.

President Donald Trump, infatuated by the Iron Dome missile defense system over Israel, first ordered the Defense Department to begin drawing up plans for a U.S. version, the ‘Golden Dome,’ in January. 

But Israel is roughly the size of New Jersey, so a dome of protection could prove far more daunting for the much larger land mass of the U.S. And the threats to Israel usually come from its neighbors, who use short-range weapons. America’s foes — North Korea, Iran, Russia and China — are half a world away and armed with intercontinental ballistics missiles (ICBMs) and hypersonics, all factors that make the project more challenging for a nation on the size and scale of the U.S.

So questions remain. Will the Golden Dome encompass the entire country, including Hawaii, Alaska and U.S. military bases in locations like Guam? Would it be able to protect against short-range missiles, long-range missiles, unmanned and manned aircraft? 

Answers may come at least in part at the end of the month, when the Department of Defense and the Office of Management and Budget present a funding plan for the project to the White House. But defense industry leaders say the technology exists to make a Golden Dome a reality. 

‘​In our view, it has to kind of be a layered system. Because, you know, shooting a UAV, for example, is very different than shooting a hypersonic vehicle or hypersonic weapon,’ Raytheon CEO Phil Jasper told Fox News Digital. His aerospace company, a major U.S. defense contractor, manufactures the Patriot missile system, Javelin anti-tank missiles and a variety of radar and air defense systems.

The U.S. already employs a layered missile defense system known as the Command, Control, Battle Management, and Communications (C2BMC) System that uses radar to detect incoming missiles and fire off interceptors. 

It has technology like the THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) battery to intercept ballistic missiles and the Patriot to intercept cruise missiles, ballistic missiles and aircraft. But the country only has seven active THAAD batteries deployed globally, with an eighth expected to become operational this year. 

Space Force Gen. Michael Guetlein said weeks ago that building a Golden Dome will require a Manhattan Project-level whole-of-government approach from the missile defense agency, Air Force, Army, Navy, Space Force, Coast Guard and more. 

Defense contractors, some of whom have believed a Golden Dome-like project was on the horizon for years, say the protection zone may start around major cities like New York and Washington, D.C., or sensitive military sites before expanding to protect the entire homeland. 

‘What I’m understanding [the goal] really is to protect the entire U.S. It is to put a dome around the homeland,’ said Edward Zoiss, president of space and airborne systems for L3Harris Technologies.

Jasper predicted some of these defensive measures could be installed rapidly, as soon as 2026. 

‘What the administration has laid out is that building block approach that you can start to protect certain areas, at times, certain regions, and build that out as you continue to produce these systems. And they can continue to come off of production lines,’ he said.  

BlueHalo CEO Jonathan Moneymaker said the dome would be ‘less of a technology problem’ and more of an organizational structure challenge. 

‘The full potential of all of those capabilities working in conjunction with each other, at that scale, there’s definitely some new elements there,’ Moneymaker said.

John Clark, Lockheed’s vice president of technology and strategic innovation, said the plan will require the Pentagon to ‘think about what it has on the shelf.’ 

‘There are systems that sit today in the Air National Guard or in our current local defense infrastructure domestically. Those could actually be deployed inside of the U.S,’ he said. 

Clark noted that deploying defense infrastructure at home would ‘draw down our current inventory for conflict in the greater world.’ But he suggested that anything pulled out of an Army base today could be backfilled at a later date for global use.

Zoiss, whose company, L3Harris Technologies, has already built satellites for the missile defense agency that could be used for space-based radar systems for a Golden Dome, said the biggest challenge is missiles that no longer follow predictable paths. 

‘If you go back to your high school physics class, if you understand the angle and trajectory of a bullet, you understand exactly where it’s going to land because it follows a parabola,’ he said. 

‘ICBMs followed parabola trajectories for decades. But a new class of highly maneuverable cruise weapons and hypersonic weapons now don’t,’ he explained. ‘Their endpoint is uncertain. And our defensive systems in the U.S. now have to change to be more robust in order to track that weapon throughout its entire trajectory.’ 

Space-based radar will be the critical element of threats to the homeland in the future, according to Zoiss. 

‘Our challenge is really long-range weapons. You know, it’s weapons progressing large distances that are maneuvering around our current land-based and sea-based radar systems. So, if the weapons maneuver around those systems, that means our current architecture can’t provide fire control ordnance. And, therefore, it has to be moved to space.’ 

The Golden Dome could draw on missile defense missions already in the works, like the National Capital Region Integrated Air Defense System, which is designed to protect Washington, D.C., from incoming threats and employs systems like the Norwegian National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile System (NASAMS).

And it could look to other systems already in the works on a smaller scale. The Army is working on a new Iron Dome-like air defense system in Guam known as the Indirect Fire Protection Capability (IFPC) Increment 2 system. And it is developing high-powered microwave systems that could knock entire drone swarms out of the sky. 

The Marine Corps is planning to field three mobile air defense systems this year, including a modified Iron Dome launcher. 

Other needs could be over-the-horizon radar, including filling blindspots in the Arctic region for low-flying missiles that hug the earth’s curvature to avoid detection. 

Guetlein said the nation would have to ‘break down the barriers’ between Title 10 and Title 50 of the United States Code, the federal laws that govern the nation’s defense and clandestine operations.

‘Without a doubt, our biggest challenge is going to be organizational behavior and culture to bring all the pieces together,’ Guetlein said.

Much of the funding is expected to be laid out in Trump’s fiscal year 2026 budget request to Congress, which the White House is working on. Even with initial funding, the project could take years to complete, and it won’t be cheap. 

Steven Morani, acting undersecretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment, said Wednesday he was working with the private sector to address the ‘formidable’ challenges of the project. 

‘Consistent with protecting the homeland and per President Trump’s executive order, we’re working with the industrial base and supply chain challenges associated with standing up the Golden Dome,’ he said. 

Democrats have pushed back after Elon Musk claimed that social security operates like a ‘Ponzi scheme’ as he continues to argue for cuts to the federal bureaucracy, but one expert tells Fox News Digital that Musk is on track with his criticism of the agency.

‘Musk’s statement about Social Security being the world’s biggest Ponzi scheme does have validity,’ James Agresti, president of the nonprofit research institute Just Facts, told Fox News Digital in response to pushback from Elon Musk’s claim, which included a ‘false’ rating from Politifact. 

‘A Ponzi scheme operates by taking money from new investors to pay current investors. That’s the definition given by the SEC, and contrary to popular belief, that’s exactly how Social Security operates.’

Agresti explained to Fox News Digital that Social Security, believed to be a target of Musk’s efforts at DOGE, ‘doesn’t take our money and save it for us, as many people believe, and then give it to us when we’re older’ like many Americans might believe. 

‘What it does is, it transfers money when we are young and working and paying into Social Security taxes,’ Agresti said. ‘That money, the vast bulk of it, goes immediately out the door to people who are currently receiving benefits. Now there is a trust fund, but in 90 years of operation, that trust fund currently has enough money to fund two years of program operations.’

The trust fund only being able to last for two years is not a result of the fund being ‘looted,’ Agresti explained, but rather it was put in place to ‘put surpluses in it’ from money that Social Security collects in taxes that it doesn’t pay out immediately and pays interest on. 

‘The interest that’s been paid on that has been higher than the rate of inflation,’ Agresti said. ‘So, the problem isn’t that the trust fund has been looted. The problem is that Social Security operates like a Ponzi scheme.’

One of the top Social Security criticisms from Republicans, including President Trump, has been a concern that individuals who are dead or listed with an age well over 100 years old are on the rolls and receiving benefits.

Agresti told Fox News Digital that there are legitimate reasons to be concerned about that issue.

‘What’s unclear to me at this moment is whether or not the people who are on the books are actually receiving checks,’ Agresti said. 

‘Back during the Obama administration, there was a stimulus, and the Obama administration sent out stimulus checks via Social Security numbers to 80,000 people who were dead, and about 70,000 of them, the Social Security Administration knew they were dead. So I don’t know if they’ve remedied that situation since then, but clearly the system is not keeping up with the pace of current data, and that provides an opportunity for fraud.’

Democrats have also made the case that Musk is attempting to strip away benefits that senior citizens have rightfully earned. Agresti told Fox News Digital that is not what is happening.

‘There’s been a lot of misinformation about that as of late,’ Agresti said. ‘You know, when DOGE came in and suggested that the Social Security Administration cut, I think it was about 10,000 workers, Democrats erupted that this is going to weaken Social Security. But the fact of the matter is that Social Security pays those workers who are for administrative overhead from the Social Security trust fund. So, by cutting out the money that they’re paying them, you actually strengthen the program financially.’

Agresti told Fox News Digital that the current administrative overhead for Social Security is $6.7 billion per year, which is enough to pay more than 300,000 retirees the average old age benefit.

Questions have emerged from critics in recent years as to whether Social Security, in its current form, is even capable of remaining solvent to pay benefits to Americans who have paid in over the past few decades.

Agresti told Fox News Digital that the program will ‘become insolvent’ as soon as 2035 if changes are not made. 

‘To give you a feel of how disconnected Social Security is from a fully funded pension plan, if to keep the program solvent and put it on the same firm financial footing as a real pension plan, it would require an extra $272,000 in additional payroll taxes from every person paying payroll taxes right now,’ Agresti told Fox News Digital. 

‘I’ll give you another way in which more numbers prove this point. If you retired in 1980, it took about three years of receiving Social Security benefits to get back the value of your payroll taxes plus interest. If you retired in 2000, it took 17 years. If you retired in 2020. it will take 22 years, assuming the program has enough money to pay those benefits, which it won’t without another increase in taxes on another generation of Americans.’