After the U.S. strikes on the Iranian nuclear program, there was considerable concern about sleeper cells within the U.S. being activated; now it is clear that they’re not the only threat from Iran that American officials have to be worried about. Are agents of the Islamic Republic also taking advantage of the still-vulnerable northern border? A news item on Tuesday certainly suggested as much.
Fox News reported that “a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) spokesman confirmed Tuesday that five Iranians were arrested while attempting to illegally cross the U.S. northern border with Canada.” CBP's Swanton Sector stated that “on July 1, Border Patrol Agents from the Champlain, New York Station, responded to suspicious activity near Mooers Forks, NY. Agents located a minivan occupied by five citizens of Iran and two citizens of Uzbekistan." Swanton, Vt., is a small town just south of the U.S.-Canadian border.
It's important not to jump to conclusions. Maybe these guys were really, really lost. Or maybe they were sneaking across the border in search of a better life, ready to do the jobs that Americans aren’t willing to do. It’s also a genuine possibility, however, that they were coming into the United States to try to make good on what by now are repeated threats from the Islamic Republic of Iran to assassinate President Donald Trump, along with members of his administration.
Increasing the suspicious aspect of this incident is the fact that “CBP said that all seven men had been previously arrested for attempting to cross the border illegally.” Now, however, because Donald Trump is president rather than Old Joe Biden’s autopen, “all seven aliens are detained and awaiting deportation.” One hopes that none of them will ever see delightful Swanton ever again.
This comes amid concerns that the Islamic Republic is bent on avenging the strikes on its nuclear program with strikes of its own inside the U.S. Jonathan Gilliam, a former FBI special agent, explained: "Where these sleeper cells may be is in plain sight. And that's the real terrifying part of this is that putting people in place, as we've seen over the past four years, everyone's scrambling because certain amounts of people could come in here and get in here."
Old Joe Biden’s border free-for-all helped bring this situation about, as Gilliam noted: “They could even go to the border and say they [want to] seek asylum, and the Biden administration, instead of putting them into DHS housing or ICE housing and holding them there so they could have their first appearance, to be vetted and whether or not they get asylum," would allow them to walk freely into the country. Despite the Trump administration’s ongoing efforts, many of them are still here.
Their gratitude toward the U.S. for taking them in when they were in their hour of need cannot be taken for granted. Back in November 2024, an Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps operative, Farhad Shakeri, was indicted for plotting to kill Trump. And in 2021, the Islamic Republic mounted an audacious operation to kidnap Masih Alinejad, an Iranian dissident, in New York City and take her back to the Islamic Republic, where she would have faced imprisonment, torture, and possibly even judicial murder.
Related: Yes, Tucker, the Islamic Republic of Iran Really Is Trying to Kill Trump — and Trump Reacts
Fox noted that the rogue regime in Tehran does this sort of thing in other countries as well: In 2023, “a United Kingdom court found a man guilty of attempting to collect information for terrorist purposes on the London-based Iran International, a media company that is critical of the Iranian regime." And "in recent years, Albania, Belgium, and the Netherlands have all either arrested, convicted, or expelled Iranian government officials implicated in various terrorist plots in their respective territories. Denmark similarly recalled its ambassador from Tehran after learning of an Iran-backed plot to kill an Iranian dissident in that country."
Given the state of rage among Iran’s mullahs against the United States, on which they have wished death so many times, it is likely that the foiled border crossing will not be the last such incident. Iranian officials are vowing nothing less than to take out the president of the United States. Will they keep trying? Will the sun come up tomorrow morning?
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