Three individuals have reportedly been charged for involvement in an Iran-linked effort to assassinate President-elect Donald Trump, the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced Friday.
Three men have been charged for their connections to an alleged conspiracy to kill a critic of the Iranian regime on American soil and to a broader effort to carry out plots against Trump and other enemies of Tehran, according to the DOJ. Two suspects — Carlisle Rivera and Jonathon Loadholt, both of New York City — have been arrested, while Farhad Shakeri of Iran remains at-large and is thought to be in his home country.
“There are few actors in the world that pose as grave a threat to the national security of the United States as does Iran,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement. “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.”
