The US received written assurances from Iran before the presidential election that its leadership was not actively trying to assassinate newly elected President Donald Trump, CBS News confirmed, according to a source with direct knowledge of the correspondence. The message came after the White House confirmed in September that the killing of a former US president or former US official would be considered an act of war by the Biden administration.
“We consider this a national and homeland security issue of the highest priority, and we strongly condemn Iran for these brazen threats,” National Security Council spokesman Sean Savett said in a statement in September.
Iran said in its message, delivered by a third party, that it understood this premise. The Wall Street Journal first reported Iran’s message to the US
The Justice Department is currently prosecuting at least two people who allegedly participated in assassin plots to kill Trump while he was still a candidate. A active who worked for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, told federal investigators that he was tasked in September to “surveil and ultimately kill” Trumpaccording to court documents unsealed last week.
Prosecutors said Farhad Shakeri, believed to be living in Iran, told investigators in a telephone interview that unnamed IRGC officials pushed him to plan an attack against Trump will take place in October. If the plan could not be completed in time, Iranian officials instructed Shakeri to postpone the plot until after the election because the official “felt that [Trump] would lose the elections,” the charging documents say.
In early August, there was talk of a Pakistani national with alleged ties to Iran arrested and charged plotting a murder-for-hire scheme targeting U.S. government officials and politicians, according to charging documents released Tuesday.
A US official pointed out that Iran has not tasked its most effective proxy force, Hezbollah, with carrying out these plots. This official described Iran’s approach so far as “nice when it works. If it doesn’t work, then it’s no problem.”
In response to questions suggesting that “Iran had told the US it would not try to kill Trump,” the Permanent Mission of the Islamic Republic of Iran said it would not comment on official communications between two countries.
The mission said in a statement: “The Islamic Republic of Iran has long been committed to pursuing the assassination of Martyr Soleimani through legal and judicial channels, while fully adhering to the recognized principles of international law.”
Trump has angered the Iranians for a number of reasons. He left the international nuclear deal with Iran, which had lifted some sanctions in exchange for restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program. He also directed the film 2020 air raid that resulted in fatalities Top Iranian commander General Qasem Soleimani. Since then, some Trump administration officials and military officials have received threats from the regime, including: Robert O’Brienwho was national security advisor during the strike. His predecessor in the position, John Bolton, who was part of the maximum pressure campaign that imposed sanctions on Tehran, has also received threats.
In 2022, the US intelligence community assessed this Iran would threaten Americans – both directly and through proxy attacks – and were determined to develop networks within the US. Two ongoing threat assessments submitted to Congress by the State Department in January 2022 reported a “serious and credible threat” to the lives of former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and former Trump Iran envoy Gov. Brian Hook. The non-public reviews revealed that during 2021 and again in 2022, the State Department determined that 24-hour U.S. taxpayer-funded diplomatic security detail was necessary to protect both men. That continues today.
Multiple former officials spoke to CBS about alerts they recently received from the FBI and other agencies regarding the continued threat from Iran and actors hired by Iran, implying that the U.S. is taking the threat seriously and not taking the Iranian authorities in stride. regime guarantees at first glance.
Robert Legare contributed to this report.
Margaret Brennan
