Iranian asset charged in plot to assassinate Trump, DOJ says
The Justice Department has recently revealed that they have successfully thwarted an Iranian plot to assassinate President-elect Donald Trump in the weeks leading up to the election. According to a criminal complaint filed in federal court in New York City, an unnamed official in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps had approached Farhad Shakeri, a 51-year-old Iranian citizen, in September and instructed him to surveil and ultimately assassinate the former President of the United States.
Attorney General Merrick Garland expressed the severity of the threat posed by Iran, stating that few actors in the world pose as grave a danger to the national security of the United States as the Iranian regime. The Justice Department has charged Shakeri, who is currently at large and believed to be residing in Iran, as an asset of the Iranian regime tasked with directing a network of criminal associates to carry out assassination plots against various targets, including President-elect Donald Trump.
In addition to Shakeri, two individuals have been arrested and charged for their alleged involvement in a separate plot to murder an American journalist who has been critical of the Iranian regime. Garland emphasized that the United States will not tolerate Iran’s attempts to endanger the American people and national security.
Shakeri, who immigrated to the United States as a child but was deported in 2008 after serving a prison sentence for robbery, was tasked with providing a plan to kill President-elect Trump in October 2024. He was also instructed to surveil two Jewish American citizens in New York City and offered a substantial sum of money for their murder. Furthermore, Shakeri was directed to target Israeli tourists in Sri Lanka.
The Justice Department highlighted that the Iranian regime is actively targeting nationals of the United States and its allies for attacks, including assault, kidnapping, and murder. This aggressive stance is believed to be in retaliation for the death of Qasem Soleimani, the former commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force, who was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Baghdad in January 2020.
Federal prosecutors have arrested Carlisle Rivera and Jonathon Loadholt in connection with a plot to murder a U.S. citizen of Iranian origin in New York. The targeted individual, Masih Alinejad, is known for her outspoken criticism of the Iranian regime and has previously been the subject of kidnapping and murder plots orchestrated by the Iranian government.
Rivera and Loadholt, at Shakeri’s direction, conducted surveillance on Alinejad in exchange for a promised payment of $100,000. The suspects shared messages and photographs related to their scheme, demonstrating their progress in locating and targeting the victim. All three individuals are facing charges of murder-for-hire, conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire, and money laundering conspiracy, with maximum penalties ranging from 10 to 20 years in prison.
Shakeri has also been charged with conspiring to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization and violating sanctions against the Government of Iran, which carry a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison. The Justice Department’s successful intervention in the Iranian plot underscores the ongoing threat posed by Iran to the United States and its allies.
