NPR News: 03-06-2026 6PM EST

Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Janine Herbst.

President Trump now says anything short of unconditional surrender by Iran would be unacceptable.

He made the comment on social media today.

Iran has shown no interest in doing that.

And foreign minister Abbas Aragchi says, despite comments from Trump that Iran asked for

talks, it's not true.

We are not asking for a ceasefire.

And we don't see any reason why we should negotiate with the U.S., when we negotiated

with them twice, and every time they attacked us at the middle of negotiations.

So there is no request for a ceasefire by us, and there is no request for the negotiation

with the U.S. from us.

Speaking there too, NBC News, Tom Yamas.

Meanwhile, President Trump met today with some of the biggest U.S. defense contractors.

And if he has Franco Ordonia's reports, it comes amid concerns about weapons stocks as

the U.S. and Israel continue strikes on Iran in the war's seventh day.

President Trump took to social media where he boasted of a very good meeting with the

largest U.S. defense manufacturing companies.

He said they have agreed to quadruple production of the, quote, exquisite class of weaponry.

Trump's are already underway, he wrote, but U.S. officials who are not authorized to speak

publicly told NPR that there are concerns about a lack of missile interceptors, and that

they may have to draw from other stockpiles.

Trump dismissed those concerns, charging that they have a virtually unlimited supply of

medium and upper-midium grade munitions, but he said those orders have been increased

as well.

CEOs attending with Trump included those from Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Raytheon.

Trump said they planned another meeting in two months.

Franco, Ordonia's, NPR News, the White House.

The disappointing update on the U.S. job market.

The labor department says the U.S. economy lost 92,000 jobs in February.

If your Scott Horsley says the numbers aren't much weaker than expected.

Job losses were widespread, with factories, construction companies, and the federal government

all shedding workers.

Even health care, which has been a source of strength in the job market, lost jobs in

February, partly as a result of a nurse's strike.

Job gains for December and January were also revised downward, with December now showing

a net loss of jobs.

The unemployment rate inched up last month, so 4.4%.

Policy makers had hoped the job market was stabilizing after anemic hiring in 2025, but

if February's job loss suggests continued weakness, average wages for those who are

working continue to climb with hourly wages up 3.8% in February from a year ago.

Scott Horsley and Pair News, Washington.

And on Wall Street at the close, the Dow was down 453 points, the Nasdaq down 361 for

the Nasdaq that's down more than 1.5%.

This is NPR News.

Netflix says it's acquired Ben Affleck's AI-powered filmmaking tool company.

If your school development reports, comes just over a week since the streamer pulled

out of a deal to acquire Warner Bros.

In a video accompanying, Netflix's announcement, Ben Affleck says his company, Interpositive's

technology, does not enable filmmakers to build scenes from scratch using prompts.

It allows them to build their own AI models based on the scenes they've already shot.

In an email to NPR, IATC, the main union supporting Hollywood's technical workers, said

it does not comment on mergers and acquisitions.

This is just the latest agreement the Oscar-winning filmmaker has struck with Netflix.

Earlier this week, Affleck and Matt Damon's production company, Artists Equity, signed

a major partnership with the streamer, Chloe Valtman, NPR News.

An asteroid Nasda used for target practice a few years ago was nudged into a slightly

different route around the Sun.

A new study says it's the first time a celestial body's solar orbit was deliberately changed.

Scientists say the impact by the dark spacecraft in 2022 not only trimmed the asteroid's orbit

around its bigger space rock companion, but also around the Sun.

Researchers say their findings could help divert any incoming killer space rock, given

enough advanced notice, the study was published in Science Advances.

I'm Janine Herbst, and you're listening to NPR News from Washington.

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