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Israel said the compound was located ‘in the heart of Tehran’

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) on Friday announced that it had dismantled former Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s underground bunker in Tehran.

“The underground compound was created by the regime as a base for advancing military activities and its extremist ideologies against the State of Israel and the Western world,” the IDF said. “It spanned multiple streets in the heart of Tehran and contained numerous entrances and meeting rooms for senior members of the Iranian terrorist regime.”

Israel later released an illustrated video which showed a number of entry points throughout Tehran with tunnels leading to the underground bunker.

The Israel Defense Forces struck former Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s bunker in Tehran.(IDF)

The fortified compound was directly under where Khamenei and other regime leaders were situated on Saturday morning when almost 50 of them were killed in under 50 seconds during the launch of Operation Epic Fury, a senior Israeli official told Fox News.

The official said that Khamenei spent millions of dollars and a number of years building the bunker, which he did not use on the morning of the strike. Sources familiar with the intelligence say that Khamenei believed no one had the guts to strike him.

The senior Israeli official told Fox News that Khamenei’s confidence was partially thanks to an Israeli-American deception plan that included messaging, signals and public statements by President Donald Trump that suggested nothing immediate was coming. Top IDF commanders even went home on Friday night, hours before the strike, in an attempt to deceive Iranian leadership.

President Donald Trump confirmed the U.S. launched strikes on Iran on Saturday, Feb. 28, 2026.(The White House via X Account/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Khamenei was killed on the first day of Operation Epic Fury after ruling the Islamic Republic for more than 30 years. During that time, he oversaw harsh internal crackdowns, including the most recent one in January, which targeted Iranian protesters, as well as international confrontations.

Fox News’ Trey Yingst and Fox News Digital’s Efrat Lachter and Ruth Marks Eglash contributed to this report.

Tehran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz and Western targeting of shadow oil fleets signal a new phase in the global energy and sanctions struggle, with far-reaching consequences for Russia, China and the world economy

By Charles Creitz
Fox News

Published March 6, 2026 12:48pm EST

Tehran’s strike campaign threatens to disrupt shadow shipping networks and sanctions-evasion routes, raising energy costs for Moscow and Beijing and potentially squeezing Russia’s war funding and China’s industrial and military supply chains.

As of Monday, the Iranian regime declared the crucial Strait of Hormuz — between Hormuz Island, Iran, and the Omani enclave of Khasab — closed, under threat of vessels being “torched.”

Oil tanker traffic immediately fell sharply as merchant seamen now fear missile strikes, but the conflict has also affected the so-called “shadow fleet” of unflagged or surreptitiously flagged oil tankers connected to economically isolated countries like Cuba, Iran and Russia.

The U.S. has already set up a quasi naval quarantine of oil imports to Cuba, while countries like Mexico have been warned against sending oil to malign regimes.

A satellite image shows the Strait of Hormuz, a key maritime passage connecting the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman, vital for global energy supply.(Amanda Macias/Fox News Digital)

European partners have also taken action against “shadow fleet” vessels, tightening the vise on China and particularly Russia amid the new unrest.

Belgium’s army on Monday interdicted a shadow-fleet tanker called the MT Ethera as it transited the North Sea.

Belgian Defense Minister Theo Francken told GCaptain News that the tanker was redirected to Zeebrugge by an escort and would be seized by Brussels.

“Operation Blue Intruder was carried out by a team of exceptionally brave service members. Excellent work,” he said, as the outlet also reported the ship was tied to a confidant of Khamenei.

The MT Ethera is reportedly linked to the son of senior political adviser Ali Shamkhani, whose family reportedly controls an entire fleet of tankers that may be used to facilitate Iranian and Russian oil trade.

A timelapse video shows marine traffic moving through the Strait of Hormuz.(Kpler/Marine Traffic)

A consortium of Western powers also enforces the Ural Price Cap, which was dropped to about $44 per barrel last month. Named for the Ural Mountains, the price cap is meant to keep Russian oil below free-market rates.

This newly emboldened Western targeting of the so-called “gray market” of shadow-fleet oil indicates potential problems for nations that rely on it, such as China and Cuba.

China reportedly relies heavily on Iran for otherwise sanctioned oil, while Russia could see further belt-tightening that could adversely affect the cash flow needed to continue its war in Ukraine.

Additionally, CENTCOM this week posted a video of a U.S. strike on a drone-carrying Iranian ship, and Cmdr. Brad Cooper said more than 30 such Tehran-linked vessels have been sunk since the offensive began, according to Naval Today.

“In the last few hours alone, we struck an Iranian drone carrier roughly the size of a World War II-era aircraft carrier, and it is currently on fire,” Cooper told the outlet.

The reported obliteration of the Ayatollah and the next 48 successors, by President Donald Trump’s count, along with the arrest of Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, leaves not only the shadow fleet but also its customer nations’ suppliers in shambles.

Just as OPEC rate hikes affect American energy prices, the deconstruction of the shadow fleet could also lead to inflation in China.

Fox News Digital reached out to the Treasury Department for more information on the effects of the shadow fleet, as it oversees the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).

In the past few weeks, OFAC has sanctioned 30 people or entities tied to enabling illegal Iranian oil sales and/or benefiting its weapons production as part of Trump’s “maximum pressure” campaign.

“OFAC targeted additional vessels operating as part of Iran’s shadow fleet, which transport Iranian petroleum and petroleum products to foreign markets and serve as the regime’s primary source of revenue for financing domestic repression, terrorist proxies, and weapons programs,” the agency said in a statement.

“Iran exploits financial systems to sell illicit oil, launder the proceeds, procure components for its nuclear and conventional weapons programs, and support its terrorist proxies,” added Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

“Treasury will continue to put maximum pressure on Iran to target the regime’s weapons capabilities and support for terrorism, which it has prioritized over the lives of the Iranian people,” Bessent said.

OFAC then listed off a dozen ships they confirmed to be “shadow fleet” vessels under sanction.

“Instead of allocating this revenue for the benefit of the Iranian people, the regime ultimately siphons it off to fund regional terrorist proxies, weapons programs, and repressive security services, rather than the basic economic needs the Iranian people have repeatedly and courageously demanded,” the Treasury said.

Ships flagged from Panama, Barbados, Palau, Comoros, Iran and Vanuatu were found by the U.S. to have transported millions of barrels of Iranian crude in recent years.

The Treasury Department, which oversees OFAC, did not respond to inquiries for this story.

Charles Creitz is a reporter for Fox News Digital.

He joined Fox News in 2013 as a writer and production assistant.

Charles covers media, politics and culture for Fox News Digital.

Charles is a Pennsylvania native and graduated from Temple University with a B.A. in Broadcast Journalism. Story tips can be sent to charles.creitz@fox.com.

Austin gunman assaulted woman at Tesla facility in December, lawsuit alleges

March 6, 2026 / 2:18 PM EST / CBS News

The gunman who carried out the mass shooting last weekend in Austin, Texas, assaulted a woman three months earlier at a Tesla facility, according to a lawsuit filed Thursday in Texas.

The suit claims Ndiaga Diagne, who shot and killed three people and wounded more than a dozen others while wearing a shirt with Iranian regime insignia on it, “violently and without provocation” attacked a 65-year-old Tesla employee in December, the lawsuit said.

The woman, Lilian Brady, never knew the identity of the man who attacked her until she recognized his face when she saw news of the shooting this week, her lawyer, Robert Hilliard, told CBS News. FBI investigators interviewed Brady this week, the lawyer, Robert Hilliard said. The FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Diagne was shot and killed by police after he fired into a crowd on an Austin bar patio at around 1:30 a.m. Sunday, March 1. He used a handgun and had a AR-style rifle with him, and there was a Quran in the SUV he used during the attack, law enforcement sources told CBS News.

Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis said Thursday that her department had never had any contact with Diagne before the shooting.

Diagne was praying on a walking path at the Tesla facility in Austin in December when he grabbed Brady and threw her to the ground, Hilliard said. The lawsuit alleges Diagne was also an employee of Tesla.

The suit accuses Tesla of negligence for allowing an employee with “known aggressive tendencies” into a common area with other employees and asks for damages of over $1 million.

Tesla also did not immediately respond to a request for comment from CBS News on the lawsuit and its allegations. CBS News has not independently confirmed Diagne’s employment.

Hilliard said Brady reported the assault to Tesla and to the Travis County Sheriff’s Office but didn’t know the name of the man or have video of the incident and wasn’t able to get either from Tesla.

The Travis County Sheriff’s Office confirmed to CBS News that it investigated, but said the case has now been closed “because the suspect is deceased.”

Hilliard said he believed local law enforcement, though not necessarily the Austin Police Department, knew of Diagne and had screened video of him at Tesla prior to Sunday’s attack.

“It may have been an early warning sign of a far greater danger,” Hilliard said.

Anna Schecter contributed to this report.

https://www.cbsnews.com/video/body-cam-shows-police-response-to-austin-bar-shooting/

Pentagon taps former DOGE official to lead its AI efforts

By Reuters
March 6, 2026 5:11 PM UTC Updated 1 hour ago

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The Pentagon logo is seen behind the podium in the briefing room at the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, U.S., January 8, 2020. REUTERS/Al Drago/File Photo [Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab]

WASHINGTON, March 6 (Reuters) – The Pentagon on Friday named as Chief Data Officer ​a computer scientist who aided billionaire Elon Musk’s efforts to ‌overhaul the government last year and who has boosted white supremacists and misogynists online.

In a social media post, the Pentagon said Gavin Kliger’s new role

Newsom says ‘Trump in retreat’ after firing Homeland Security chief Noem | Fox News

Fox News

Newsom declares ‘Trump is in retreat’ after Noem ouster, demands Miller be ‘next’

California governor claims firing shows Trump is ‘in retreat’ and calls for Stephen Miller to be next

By Paul Steinhauser
Fox News

Published March 6, 2026 12:55pm EST

Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom of California argues that President Donald Trump’s ouster of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is the latest sign of decline for the Republican president.

“Donald Trump is in retreat,” Newsom said Thursday evening in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, the latest stop on his national book tour. “Today is a perfect example — the first firing of a high-profile Cabinet member.”

The firing of Noem, a one-time MAGA rock star and close ally of the president who was steering Trump’s centerpiece policy of mass deportations as part of the White House crackdown on illegal immigration, rocked the nation’s capital and the political world.

Trump’s move to remove Noem from the top spot at the Department of Homeland Security came amid mounting criticism of her performance not only from Democrats, but also among some Republicans and members of Trump’s political circle.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is sworn in before she testifies during a Senate Judiciary Committee oversight hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, March 3, 2026.(Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP Photo)

Newsom, a vocal Trump critic who is likely to seek the presidency in 2028, hours earlier took to social media after the news about Noem broke to write “BYE GIRL!”

At his New Hampshire stop, Newsom claimed that “the dark heart of the administration is not Kristi Noem, it’s Stephen Miller,” who is White House deputy chief of staff and a longtime top Trump advisor dating back to the president’s first White House run in 2016.

“It had Noem’s fingerprints all over it, but it was Stephen Miller’s handbook, and he needs to be next,” Newsom said, as he referred to the 2025 move by Trump to send National Guard troops to California in response to immigration protests.

Fox News Digital reached out to the White House for reaction to Newsom’s comments but had not received a response at the time this story published.

White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller listens during a meeting with President Donald Trump and oil company executives in the East Room of the White House in Washington, D.C., on January 9, 2026.(Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images)

Newsom’s latest book tour stop came two days after Democrats’ turnout in Tuesday’s primaries in Texas surged to record levels, a promising sign for the party out of power ahead of this year’s midterm elections, when the GOP will be defending its narrow majorities in the House and Senate.

“Donald Trump is the leader of the get out the vote for the Democratic Party,” Newsom emphasized, as he discussed this week’s primary elections.

Newsom’s stop in New Hampshire, the state that for a century has traditionally held the first presidential primary in the race for the White House, fueled further speculation about a 2028 run by the two-term governor of solidly blue California.

The tour also recently took Newsom to South Carolina, and he stopped in Nevada on Wednesday. Both states, along with New Hampshire, hold crucial early voting presidential primaries in the Democratic calendar and all three are vying for the top spot in the party’s 2028 nominating schedule.

California Governor Gavin Newsom, who is considered a likely contender for the 2028 presidential election, speaks about his new memoir “Young Man in a Hurry,” during a book tour event in the state which traditionally holds the nation’s first primary election for president every four years, at The Music Hall in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.(Brian Snyder/Reuters)

Newsom’s book tour for his memoir, “Young Man in a Hurry,” has not been without controversy.

At a book event in Los Angeles recently, Newsom stirred controversy by comparing Israel to an “apartheid state.”

On Thursday, he explained that he was referring to a column by nationally known political commentator and author Tom Friedman, amid the ongoing U.S. and Israeli attacks on Iran. The weeklong strikes have resulted in the deaths of many of Iran’s top leaders, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Newsom said, “Tom used that word apartheid as it relates to the direction that Israel leader Benjamin Netanyahu, a Trump ally, ‘is going, particularly on the annexation of the West Bank.’”

“I’m very angry about this war with all due respect, not because I’m angry the supreme leader is dead, quite the contrary. I’m not naive about the last 37 years of his reign, 47 years since the ’79 revolution,” the governor said.

But taking aim at Trump, Newsom added, “I’m also mindful that you have a president who still is inarticulate and incapable of giving us the rationale of, why, why? Now, what’s the end game?”

Newsom’s memoir chronicles his life from a childhood where he coped with dyslexia to his current role as California governor and a high profile national politician.

At a book tour event in March in Atlanta, Newsom’s remarks about his low SAT test scores and his difficulty reading speeches were pummeled by many on the right as being racially insensitive to Black people.

The governor pushed back, calling the criticism “MAGA-manufactured outrage.”

Newsom is the latest potential Democratic 2028 presidential contender to stop in New Hampshire.

Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, center, and Rep. Chris Pappas of New Hampshire, a Democratic Senate candidate, campaign in Manchester, New Hampshire, Feb. 19, 2026.(Paul Steinhauser/Fox News)

Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who finished a close second to Sen. Bernie Sanders in New Hampshire’s 2020 Democratic presidential primary, made a three-day swing through the state in February.

And Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, who stopped in New Hampshire in autumn 2025, returns this weekend. Rep. Ro Khanna of California, another likely White House hopeful, also just returned to the Granite State.

The most recent poll in the 2028 Democratic presidential nomination race in the first-in-the-nation presidential primary state, conducted in February by the University of New Hampshire Survey Center, indicated Buttigieg at 20% support, with Newsom and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York at 15%.

Former Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democrats’ 2024 nominee, and Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona each stood at 10%, with everyone sampled in the survey registering in single digits.

Related Article

Kristi Noem ousted from Homeland Security post amid recent turmoil

Paul Steinhauser is a politics reporter based in the swing state of New Hampshire. He covers the campaign trail from coast to coast.

Airstrikes alone unlikely to result in regime change in Iran, expert warns: “It has never worked”

March 6, 2026 / 12:44 PM EST / CBS News

Washington— U.S. and Israeli airstrikes alone are unlikely to result in the ouster of the Iranian government, according to an expert in air campaigns, who said that the risks are growing for a more drawn-out war that could spread beyond the Middle East.

Robert Pape, a professor of political science at the University of Chicago who has studied air power for three decades, told CBS News 24/7 that history does not support the idea that bombing alone can unseat a regime and install a more friendly leader.

“The fact of the matter is, for over a century, states have been trying to topple regimes with air power alone and — I’m choosing my words carefully — it has never worked,” Pape told CBS News 24/7 on Friday. “We are heading toward the predictable result of growing risk, growing escalation. And I’m sorry to say this could go on for quite some time.”

Israeli airstrikes at the start of the war killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and dozens of other top government officials, but the country’s military and senior clerics still control the levers of power. The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps has continued to launch retaliatory drone and missile attacks across the region, and a clerical body has been working to select the country’s next supreme leader.

Pape said the initial U.S. and Israeli strikes failed to “produce quick and decisive victory.”

“It’s ultimately a self-defeating policy practice politically. We are injecting nationalism, and the usual result is you get a more hard-line leader. This is why President Trump is saying, ‘I don’t want that one guy,’” he said, referring to Khamenei’s son. “It’s because he would be much worse than what we had before.”

President Trump warned Friday that he will accept nothing less than “UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER,” and has not ruled out the use of ground troops.

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The president has called for the Iranian people to seize the opportunity to overthrow the government, but he has also signaled he could accept a new leader in the current power structure if they are more amenable to the U.S. Mr. Trump has frequently cited the example of Venezuela, where American forces captured President Nicolás Maduro and installed an interim leader who is cooperating with the U.S.

Amos Yadlin, the former head of Israeli military intelligence, told CBS News on Friday that no reasonable person in the Israeli government or military believes regime change is feasible at this point.

Pape said that Iran “can do many things to prolong the war and hurt us and never fight a set-piece battle with us.”

“That’s how we lost the Vietnam War. And I’m sorry to say, we’re heading down a road where we don’t have a strategy to win,” he added.

U.S. allies in the Gulf have warned that they are running low on interceptors needed to take out Iranian missiles, CBS News reported Thursday, adding to concerns about the ability to replenish stockpiles of expensive weapons used to repel comparatively low-cost drones and missiles.

Pape said he began studying the effectiveness of bombing campaigns in the 1980s to understand how the U.S. lost in Vietnam, despite overwhelming advantages in technology and resources. He said he began working with the U.S. Air Force with the emergence of precision-guided weapons in the 1990s.

“All of a sudden you talked about intel. This was the whole idea. The idea is, ‘Wow, we have precision targeting. We’ll do this with precision intel. We really can now take down governments,’” he said. “And notice, we just can’t simply do that. We’ve tried over and over and over in the precision age. There’s a record of zero success in the last 30 years. And the reason is because the targeting is so mesmerizing, you don’t see the long war coming.”

Pape said the risk of the current conflict is that “this will not just stop at escalation in the Middle East. This will start to escalate more globally as the weeks and time goes on.” He said Iran and its proxy groups could begin to strike targets around the world.

“There’s not really a strategy here. Doubling down, talking tough and smack in front of your publics — that is the way democracies often get into these long wars,” he said. “And then those leaders basically look like embarrassments years later, because it turns out it just doesn’t work. So where is the strategy, is my question.”

Pape’s concerns mirror others expressed by analysts and experts in recent days as the outlines of the war have come into focus. Elliot Ackerman, a CBS News contributor and former CIA officer, told CBS News’ “The Takeout” earlier this week that the war is “incredibly risky.”

“It relies upon elements of Iranian civil society to rise up and take control of their government. We are toppling a regime in a region that is extremely complex. Iran is the second-largest country in the Middle East,” he said. “And I just am very skeptical that this isn’t going to get very, very messy and that it’s not going to be over for quite some time.”

Matt Gutman contributed to this report.

US collected $166 billion under IEEPA duties, customs agency says

By Reuters
March 6, 2026 4:15 PM UTC Updated 3 hours ago

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APM Terminals at the Port of Los Angeles, California, U.S., March 4, 2026. REUTERS/Mike Blake Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab

WASHINGTON, March 6 (Reuters) – The U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency said on Friday it collected about $166 billion in duties and deposits under the emergency tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump that were struck down by the Supreme Court.

CBP said in a Court of International Trade filing declaring that it could not comply with a judge’s order to begin processing refunds that there were about 20.1 million entries under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act tariffs that were unliquidated, or not finalized, as of March 4.

The Reuters Iran Briefing newsletter keeps you informed with the latest developments and analysis of the Iran war. Sign up here.

Reporting by David Lawder; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama

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Russia providing intelligence to Iran about U.S. positions, sources say

Updated on: March 6, 2026 / 1:44 PM EST / CBS News

Russia is providing intelligence to Iran regarding U.S. positions during the ongoing military operation, three sources, including a senior U.S. official with direct knowledge, told CBS News on Friday.

The intelligence assistance is the first known assistance Russia is giving to Iran, as the U.S. and Israel continue to strike at the Iranian regime and its military capabilities. The intelligence aid from Russia was first reported by the Washington Post.

Earlier Friday, Kremlin press secretary Dmitry Peskov told reporters that Russia’s government is in “dialogue” with representatives of the Iranian leadership. Peskov’s comments, his only remarks in relation to Iran at his Friday briefing, came after Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Russia and China were assisting Iran politically and “in other ways.”

Peskov declined to comment to the Post when asked about the intelligence findings.

The White House did not directly comment on Russia’s involvement, telling CBS News that “the Iranian regime is being absolutely crushed.”

“Their ballistic missile retaliation is decreasing every day, their navy is being wiped out, their production capacity is being demolished, and proxies are hardly putting up a fight. Operation Epic Fury is meeting or surpassing all of its goals, and the United States will continue to dominate,” Anna Kelly, White House principal deputy press secretary, said in a statement.

Meanwhile, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, when asked during an appearance on Fox News about Russia providing intelligence to Iran on U.S. assets, said she could not comment on “intelligence reports that are leaked to the press.”

“Whether or not this happened, frankly, it doesn’t really matter, because President Trump and the United States military are absolutely decimating the rogue Iranian terrorist regime,” she added.

Later she told reporters, “It clearly is not making a difference with respect to the military operations in Iran, because we are completely decimating them.”

So far, six U.S. troops have been killed in the military offensive the Trump administration is calling Operation Epic Fury. They died when an Iranian strike hit a tactical operations center where they were working in Kuwait. All six were members of a U.S. Army Reserve unit based in Des Moines, Iowa.

President Trump is expected to attend the dignified transfer of those service members when they are returned to the United States.

Virginia passes legislation prohibiting schools from teaching falsehoods about Jan. 6 riot

March 6, 2026 / 2:14 PM EST / CBS News

Virginia’s legislature has passed a bill prohibiting schools from teaching what it considers to be falsehoods about the Jan. 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol riot, including portraying it “as peaceful protest.”

The General Assembly approved the measure Thursday, as a first-of-its-kind legislation to combat false statements by supporters of President Trump.

The bill says that school instruction must “Not describe, portray, or present as credible a description or portrayal of the actions precipitating or involved in the events of the January 6, 2021, insurrection as peaceful protest.”

Schools may also not “state, suggest, or present as credible a statement or suggestion that there was extensive election fraud that could have changed or actually changed the results of the 2020 presidential election.”

Instead, the measure says that school instruction must “Describe the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the United States Capitol as an unprecedented, violent attack on United States democratic institutions, infrastructure, and representatives for the purpose of overturning the results of the 2020 presidential election.”

The legislation was sponsored by state delegate Dan Helmer, a Democrat from Northern Virginia. In the state Senate, the bill passed 21-19 — the chamber’s 19 Republicans opposed the measure. CBS News has requested comment from Virginia state Senate GOP leader.

State and local police in Virginia were among the law enforcement responders who helped repel the rioting mob on Jan. 6, 2021.

“The White House has tried to rewrite history,” Helmer told CBS News. “I don’t want to celebrate traders in our public schools.”

The White House posted a series of lies about Jan. 6 on an official federal government web page on Jan. 6, 2026, including a bogus claim that police bore responsibility for the attack.

Helmer’s bill is expected to be signed by Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger, a Democrat who was elected in November and who served in Congress at the time of the Capitol attack.

A spokesperson for Spanberger said, “The Governor will review all legislation that comes to her desk.”

Helmer, who spoke by phone with CBS News from the State Capitol, said, “This bill does not mandate the teaching of Jan. 6. It just says that if you do it, you have to do so in line with the actual facts of the day.”

President Trump and his surrogates and supporters have characterized the events of Jan. 6 as patriotic. They’ve also claimed the prosecutions of U.S. Capitol rioters represented a political “weaponization” of the Justice Department by the Biden administration.

Mr. Trump pardoned more than 1,500 Capitol riot defendants, including hundreds charged with beating and maiming police officers during the assault.

Helmer told CBS News, “The bill provides guardrails for our schools.”

“We have a history in Virginia, of celebrating the ‘lost cause of the Civil War’ and the Confederacy in our schools, trying to rewrite history that way,” Helmer said. “We have a long history of some of that going the wrong way.”

“Delegate Helmer’s bill requiring any education in school curriculum be fact-based, truthful and honest is a no-brainer,” said Harry Dunn, a former Capitol Police officer who responded to stop the mob on Jan. 6. Dunn, who is now running for the Democratic nomination for a U.S. House seat in Maryland, told CBS News, “This bill isn’t politically left. Any opponents of the bill who suggest otherwise are the ones who are making it ‘political.’ The world saw that happened that day and who was responsible for it,” said Dunn.

New York’s legislature is also considering new legislation to require proper teaching of the Capitol siege. Long Island Democratic state Rep. Chuck Lavine has proposed legislation in New York to require all public schoolchildren to receive instruction about the insurrection.

“The idea is to require New York students to be instructed about what happened on Jan. 6 and its aftermath,” Lavine told CBS News. “We can’t sweep history under the rug. If we don’t teach our students about the truth of history, we are doing them a grave disservice. And we’d be doing a disservice to our nation as well.”

His legislation must be passed by December in order to become law.

“This is part of civic responsibility,” Lavine said. “People are entitled to their own political beliefs, but they are not entitled to change facts.”

“Anyone of good faith who watched what happened on that day recognizes the threat to democracy represented by what occurred on that day,” Lavine said. “The old line is, ‘Those who ignore history are condemned to repeat its mistake.’”

Brendan Ballou, a former Justice Department prosecutor who handled Jan. 6 cases, told CBS News, “It’s absolutely essential that the reality of Jan. 6 not be forgotten and the history of the day not be rewritten.”

“Kudos to Virginia for pushing back on the relentless gaslighting about January 6th and the 2020 election,” said former prosecutor Mike Gordon, who also handled a number of Jan. 6 prosecutions. “Kids should learn the truth.”

Is Trump saying Kristi Noem committed perjury?

Analysis by Aaron Blake | 14 min ago | PUBLISHED Mar 6, 2026, 1:57 PM ET

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem testifies before a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Capitol Hill, on March 3, 2026.

Elizabeth Frantz/Reuters

Either President Donald Trump isn’t telling the truth, or Kristi Noem seems to have committed perjury.

There’s not really a third alternative, at this point.

Trump on Thursday could have just relieved Noem of her duties, as he did. But he didn’t stop at that; he also repeatedly appeared to deny portions of her testimony — which she gave under oath — to the Senate this week.

Specifically, Trump took issue with her claims that he was aware of and had approved a controversial $220 million Department of Homeland Security ad campaign that prominently featured Noem.

(The ad campaign is controversial not just because of the dollar amount and how much it promoted Noem personally, but also because it resulted in a lucrative subcontract for the husband of a now-former DHS spokesperson, according to a report by ProPublica.)

Noem repeatedly signaled in her testimony that Trump was aware of and even approved of the ad campaign. Trump is telling a very different story.

“[I never knew anything about it],” he told Reuters on Thursday, shortly before Noem was ousted.

“[I didn’t know about it],” Trump added later in an interview with NBC News.

But how directly does that contradict Noem’s testimony? And who appears to have told the truth?

It’s worth noting that even if Noem did commit perjury, it’s rare to see someone prosecuted for lying to Congress. Some Democrats are already beating this drum on Noem, but Republicans would have to be on board to even make a referral to the Department of Justice, which would ultimately decide whether to pursue charges.

Still, Democrats could pursue the matter later if and when they control more levers of government.

Let’s break down what we know.

Noem clearly confirmed Trump knew

---

Noem faced questions on this topic Tuesday from both Republican Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana and Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff of California.

She was at times evasive when they tried to pin down exactly what Trump had approved. But Noem clearly agreed that Trump knew about the ad campaign and even the dollar amount, and that he consented to them.

When Kennedy asked her if Trump asked her to run the ads, Noem said, “We had that conversation, yes …”

Perhaps sensing a little wiggle room in Noem’s answer, Kennedy asked again whether “you’re testifying that President Trump approved this ahead of time.”

“We had conversations about making sure that we were telling people…” Noem began.

But Kennedy cut her off, seemingly sensing that she was avoiding a direct answer.

“No, ma’am. I’m asking you — sorry to interrupt,” Kennedy said. “But the president approved, ahead of time, you spending $220 million running TV ads across the country in which you are featured prominently?”

Finally, Noem answered directly: “Yes, sir.”

“We went through the legal processes, did it correctly, worked with (the Office of Management and Budget) –” she added.

Kennedy again, though, seemed to believe this was somewhat evasive — that she said “yes” but then quickly pivoted to the legal process rather than Trump’s role.

So he twice asked her if Trump knew she was going to do the ads.

Noem twice replied, simply, “Yes.”

Kennedy ultimately said it was “hard for me to believe” that Trump signed off on the amount.

Evasive again

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But then Schiff began asking about the subject. And suddenly Noem was more evasive again. Rather than answer the question, she talked about the importance of the ads’ message.

When asked how she knew Trump approved of spending $220 million, Noem replied: “We had conversations and worked with OMB to make sure that the funding was there.”

Schiff kept trying. He asked whether she had “conversations directly with the president where he approved this $220 million ad campaign” and whether “the president approved this expenditure.” Both times, Noem talked around the questions.

What to make of this?

It’s somewhat normal for politicians to give evasive answers. It’s why they often don’t respond with yesses or nos but instead put things in their own words.

But it is strange how the answers to these questions weren’t always, “Yes.” If Trump was fully on board with all of this and knew about the details, that would seem to be something Noem would want to scream from the mountaintops.

Still, due to Kennedy’s persistence, Noem ultimately claimed Trump was not only aware of the ads and approved of them, but also consented to the dollar amount.

That’s virtually impossible to square with Trump’s flat denial that he “never knew anything about it.”

It could be Trump who isn’t telling the truth

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Noem’s best defense here might be that it’s actually Trump who isn’t telling the truth.

After all, as the Atlantic noted late Thursday, this isn’t the first time Noem has said Trump was aware of and approved of the ads. She also said so back in February 2025, shortly after these conversations would have taken place.

Appearing at the Conservative Political Action Conference, Noem recalled detailed conversations with Trump about the ad campaign.

She said Trump cited the “beautiful ads you did about South Dakota,” and said, “I want you to do those for the border.”

She also said the president told her that she should appear in the ads, rather than Trump. She even said he urged her to include specific content: “I want you to thank me for closing the border.”

“They will run throughout the world, letting America and the world know it has a new leader,” Trump said, according to Noem.

It’s certainly possible Noem wasn’t telling the truth back then. But her story was detailed. And as a newly christened DHS secretary, it would seem risky to come in and immediately invent a conversation you had with Trump in a public event.

Whatever the case, who lied remains an important question — Noem is still going to be a government employee. Trump said she will continue serving in government as special envoy for “The Shield of the Americas,” a policy initiative focused on the Western Hemisphere.

So who’s telling the truth? The outgoing DHS secretary with the credibility problem? Or the president with the credibility problem? Stay tuned.