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As charges were brought against several Iranians in connection with a plot to kill the once and future president, the current administration’s line in the sand loomed large.
In the lead-up to the 2024 presidential election, the rhetoric from the left wasn’t the only threat posed by then-former President Donald Trump who had faced multiple assassination attempts. Now, as the Department of Justice unsealed charges in a murder-for-hire plot connected to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the Biden-Harris administration’s previous caution about an “act of war” begged a response.
Friday, the DOJ charged Jonathon Loadholt, 36, of Staten Island; Carlisle Rivera, 49, of Brooklyn; and Farhad Shakeri, 51, of Iran for their alleged involvement in attempts to kill Trump and others. The motivation against the now-president-elect had persisted since he’d ordered a lethal drone strike against Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani in Jan. 2020.
“We consider this a national and homeland security matter of the highest priority, and we strongly condemn Iran for these brazen threats,” National Security Council spokesperson Sean Savitt had told Fox News in an October statement as President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken were reported to consider an attempt on Trump’s life “an act of war” to be met with kinetic military action.
“There are few actors in the world that pose as grave a threat to the national security of the United States as does Iran,” asserted Attorney General Merrick Garland as the charges were unsealed. “The Justice Department has charged an asset of the Iranian regime who was tasked by the regime to direct a network of criminal associates to further Iran’s assassination plots against its targets, including President-elect Donald Trump.”
“We have also charged and arrested two individuals who we allege were recruited as part of that network to silence and kill, on U.S. soil, an American journalist who has been a prominent critic of the regime. We will not stand for the Iranian regime’s attempts to endanger the American people and America’s national security,” he went on.
The complaint noted that the IRGC has been designated a foreign terrorist organization since April 2019 and had publicly stated its desire to avenge the death of Soleimani.
Meanwhile, as the threats against Trump were considered “top-tier” national security issues, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei had “categorically dismissed allegations that Iran was involved in attempts to assassinate former and current US officials.”
In a statement released Saturday and reported by Fox News, the spokesman asserted the claims were a “malicious conspiracy orchestrated by Zionist and anti-Iranian circles, aimed at further complicating the issues between the US and Iran.”
While Shakeri was believed to be in Iran and remained at large, Loadholt and Rivera had been taken into custody and each had been charged with murder-for-hire, conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire, and money laundering conspiracy, which carried maximum sentences of 10, 10 and 20 years in prison respectively.
Shakeri had previously served 14 years in prison for a robbery conviction after which he had been deported.
“Today’s charges are another message to those who continue in their efforts,” said U.S. Attorney Damian Williams for the Southern District of New York, “we will remain unrelenting in our pursuit of bad actors, no matter where they reside, and will stop at nothing to bring to justice those who harm our safety and security. I want to thank the career prosecutors of this office and our law enforcement partners for their ongoing work in this and related investigations. They are truly the best of the best and work tirelessly to keep our country safe.”
Native of Brooklyn, NY, Kevin Haggerty is a graduate of Hunter College where he studied Cultural Anthropology and Geography. An avid reader and truth seeker, he currently resides in Texas with his wife and their dog and, when he isn’t researching current events and their impacts, you’ll find him spending time with friends and family or working on his next novel.
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