The Justice Department has been dancing around it. The Pakistani national “with close ties to Iran” arrested in August had allegedly been dispatched to the U.S. “to assassinate a politician or U.S. government official on U.S. soil,” according to the DOJ. But in truth, not just any politician would do. Law enforcement had long warned that Iran-backed agents were determined to mete out revenge for the strike that neutralized Qasem Soleimani in 2020. Only a ranking Trump administration official — Mike Pompeo, John Bolton, Donald Trump himself — would satisfy Tehran’s desire for payback.
Following the first attempt on Trump’s life, reporters got wind of active Iranian assassination plots being tracked by U.S. intelligence, but only to dismiss the rumors that the assassin in Butler, Pa., had been directed by Iran. And yet, that threat has not abated. Rather, it seems to be maturing.
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