Iran launched new attacks on Tuesday at Israel and Gulf Arab countries as it kept up pressure on the Middle East in a war started by Israel and the United States that has rattled world markets and shows no signs of a letup.
At the Pentagon, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth warned that Tuesday “will be yet again our most intense day of strikes inside Iran: The most fighters, the most bombers, the most strikes, intelligence more refined and better than ever.”
Shortly before the statement, he said “the last 24 hours have seen Iran fire the lowest amount of missiles they have fired yet.”
Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said U.S. forces hit more than 5,000 targets, and that their three objectives included destruction of Iranian ballistic missile and drone capability; hitting Iran’s navy to allow movement through the Strait of Hormuz; and hitting “deeper into Iran’s military and industrial base.”
The Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday approved a generic medication for a rare brain disorder, while walking back suggestions by President Donald Trump and other administration officials that the drug showed great promise for people with autism.
The agency said it approved leucovorin for children and adults with a genetic condition that limits delivery of folate, an essential form of vitamin B, to the brain. FDA officials estimate the ultrarare condition impacts fewer than 1 in a million people in the U.S.
It’s a major step back from statements made at a White House news conference in September, when Trump and FDA commissioner Marty Makary announced the drug was under review to benefit patients with autism, some of whom have a form of the vitamin brain deficiency.
Agents with the U.S. Transportation Security Administration are expected to work without pay during the ongoing shutdown of the department, which began Feb. 14. Democratic lawmakers have said DHS won’t get funded until new restrictions are placed on federal immigration operations following the fatal shootings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minneapolis earlier this year.
Chris Sununu, president and CEO of Airlines for America, a trade group for U.S. airlines, in a statement urged Congress and the Trump administration to act.
“We are in spring break travel season and expecting record numbers of people to take to the skies. Airlines have done their part to prepare; now Congress and the administration must act with urgency to reach a deal that reopens DHS and ends this shutdown,” he said. “America’s transportation security workforce is too important to be used as political leverage.”
Abby Madsen can be reached at mads3817@stthomas.edu.
