A Pakistani national has been accused of hatching an elaborate plot to assassinate Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump in what sounds like a spy thriller.
US Attorney General Merrick Garland, who announced charges against Asif Merchant on Tuesday, indicated the target was Trump but did not name him.
“For several years, the Department of Justice has been working aggressively to counter Iran’s brazen and relentless efforts to retaliate against U.S. public officials for the assassination of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani,” he said.
Trump was the US President who ordered the assassination of Iranian Major General Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad in 2020, which points towards Trump being the mastermind behind the assassination plot.
According to court documents, other people may also be the intended victims, as targets are mentioned in the plural.
“The dangerous assassination plot exposed in today’s indictments was allegedly masterminded by a Pakistani national with close ties to Iran and is directly part of Iranian strategy,” said FBI Director Christopher Wray.
The alleged conspirator, also known as Asif Raza Merchant, told authorities he has two wives, one in Pakistan and the other in Iran, and has children in both countries.
The complaint filed in federal court in Brooklyn says the plot resembles a spy thriller, with an elaborate plan to burglarize the target’s home, create distraction through protests and rallies, and then assassinate the politician.
It also delves into the relationship between Merchant, 46, and the intelligence officers he thought were professional killers.
Court documents say the plot involved several elements: stealing documents or USB drives from the target’s home; planning a protest, and assassinating a politician or government official.
Merchant created code names for each element of the conspiracy: “T-shirt” for protests, “flannel shirt” for stealing documents, “fleece jacket” for assassinations, and “yarn-dye” for their meetings.
To woo the man he had first approached and who had informed the authorities, Merchant told him that one of his uncles was into “yarn-dyeing” business in Pakistan and he could do business with him.
He asked the government source, whom he believed to be the hired assassin, to explain how the target would die under various scenarios.
The plot came to light less than a month after the failed assassination attempt on Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13.
However, there appears to be no link between Merchant’s plot and the attempt, which authorities have said was carried out by a lone individual, not linked to any group or organisation.
The plot failed because Merchant tried to recruit FBI agents for the assassination attempt.
“Fortunately, the assassins Merchant attempted to hire were undercover FBI agents,” said Christy Curtis, acting assistant director of the New York FBI field office.
He was arrested on July 12 while he was preparing to catch a flight out of the country.
According to the conspiracy details detailed in court documents, Merchant arrived in the US from Pakistan in April after spending some time in Iran.
They contacted a person they thought could help them and that person reported it to law enforcement and became a confidential source.
In mid-June Merchant met with some men he thought were the killers, but they were undercover U.S. law enforcement officers (UC) in New York.
He told them he wanted them to steal documents, organise protests at political rallies, and assassinate a “political figure”.
Merchant told intelligence officials that the plot would be executed after he left the country and they would be informed about the targets in the last week of August or the first week of September.
He obtained $5,000 from abroad and paid it in advance to the undercover agents.
According to court documents, after receiving the money, an agent said, “Now we know we’re moving forward. We’re doing this,” to which Merchant replied: “Yeah, absolutely.”
Political violence is a continuing concern in America.
Last week, a man was arrested in Virginia for allegedly threatening to kill Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris.
According to the FBI complaint filed in federal court, Frank Lucio Carrillo wrote on a right-wing social media site, “Kamala Harris should be burned alive. If no one else does it I will do it personally… I want her to die a slow and painful death.”
He also allegedly threatened President Joe Biden and FBI chief Wray.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
