Asif Merchant, a 46-year-old Pakistani national, was arrested on Tuesday and charged with plotting to murder a politician or U.S. government official on American soil.
Merchant's plot never got very far. He tried to hire hitmen in June who turned out to be FBI agents. He was arrested on July 12 — which happened to be the day before the assassination attempt on Donald Trump in Pennsylvania.
No connection between Thomas Crooks and Merchant or any foreign plot against Trump has been made.
Federal authorities are alleging that Iran was behind Merchant's plot.
“For years, the Justice Department has been working aggressively to counter Iran’s brazen and unrelenting efforts to retaliate against American public officials for the killing of Iranian General [Qasem] Soleimani,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a written statement Tuesday.
In 2022, the FBI arrested a member of Iran's Revolutionary Guards for plotting to kill former national security advisor John Bolton. Iran has also tried to kill Iranian activists in the United States, including journalist Masih Alinejad.
“The Justice Department will spare no resource to disrupt and hold accountable those who would seek to carry out Iran’s lethal plotting against American citizens, and will not tolerate attempts by an authoritarian regime to target American public officials and endanger America’s national security,” Garland said.
Merchant allegedly told the source that his plan involved several criminal schemes, including stealing documents or computer data from a target’s home, planning a protest and killing a politician or government official.
Officials say he also described clothing-related code words that he would use to direct them from overseas about what he wanted them to do — “tee-shirt” would mean a protest, “flannel shirt” would mean stealing, and “fleece jacket” would mean “commit the act of the game” — a phrase prosecutors said meant killing someone.
He then described potential assassination scenarios, including situations in which there was extensive security around the person, according to court documents. He also indicated that any such assassination would take place after Merchant had left the United States, probably in late August or early September, officials said.
“This dangerous murder-for-hire plot exposed in today’s charges allegedly was orchestrated by a Pakistani national with close ties to Iran and is straight out of the Iranian playbook,” FBI Director Christopher Wray said in a press release announcing the murder-for-hire case.
How "dangerous" was the plot? Even an incompetent like Merchant might have gotten lucky. The FBI, Secret Service, and federal authorities had to take the threat extremely seriously even though they uncovered it almost immediately, thanks to an unknown confidential source.
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The unnamed source got in touch with the FBI immediately after Merchant made it clear he wanted to hire hitmen to kill people. The source then introduced Merchant to two "hitmen" who were actually FBI agents.
In a subsequent meeting, Merchant allegedly told the source that his three-pronged plot involved stealing documents from a target’s home, planning a protest, and killing a politician or government official.
The “people who will be targeted are the ones who are hurting Pakistan and the world, [the] Muslim world,” Merchant allegedly said. “These are not normal people.”
Merchant then gamed out a potential assassination plot by moving objects around a napkin on a table, according to the complaint.
Iran is going to keep trying to kill Trump. They are relentless. But they're also incredibly stupid. Killing a former president or any high-ranking official of the United States would mean a rain of ruin from the air that Iran cannot imagine.
But they're fanatics. And by definition, fanatics don't listen to reason.
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