Asif Merchant, 46, is accused of attempting to hire a hitman in New York to kill prominent American officials.
FBI Director Christopher Wray described the scheme as a “dangerous murder-for-hire plot… straight out of the Iranian playbook.”
Sources cited by CBS indicate that Donald Trump was among Merchant’s targets.
Security for the Republican presidential nominee was increased in June after authorities learned of an Iranian plot to kill him.
“A foreign-directed plot to kill a public official, or any U.S. citizen, is a threat to our national security and will be met with the full might and resources of the FBI,” Mr. Wray said on Tuesday, August 6.
Mr. Merchant was arrested in July and is currently being held in New York.
According to the Justice Department’s indictment, Mr. Merchant arrived in the U.S. from Pakistan in April after spending time in Iran.
Upon arriving, he allegedly contacted a person whom he believed could assist with the assassination plot. That unnamed contact later reported Mr. Merchant to the police.
Mr. Merchant allegedly made a “finger gun” motion with his hand when discussing his intentions.
The indictment stated that the job would not be a “one-time opportunity” and that ongoing services would be needed.
Mr. Merchant allegedly told the contact he planned to leave the U.S. before the targets were killed and that he would stay in contact using code words.
The suspect asked the contact to arrange a meeting with potential assassins, according to the indictment. In June, the contact connected him with undercover FBI agents posing as hitmen.
Mr. Merchant allegedly instructed the agents to steal documents from the home of a target, arrange protests at political rallies, and kill a “political person.”
The indictment indicated that Mr. Merchant planned to reveal the targets in the last week of August or the first week of September.
While the indictment does not mention Trump by name, sources cited by CBS said the former president was one of the intended targets.
The plot is unrelated to the assassination attempt on the former president at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13 by 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, who was shot and killed by a Secret Service sniper on site.
Trump and officials, including his former Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, have faced threats from Tehran since ordering the drone strike assassination of Qassim Soleimani, the commander of Iran’s Quds Force, in Iraq in 2020.
