Iranian murder-for-hire plot against Trump revealed as 2 New Yorkers also busted in plan to kill journalist

Iran instructed one of its agents running a New York City-based criminal network to stalk and assassinate former President Donald Trump in the 2024 election’s final weeks — telling him that “money’s not an issue,” the feds revealed Friday.

An unnamed official in Iran’s notorious Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps tasked Farhad Shakeri, 51, during September to “focus on surveilling, and, ultimately, assassinating” Trump, according to a bombshell criminal complaint unsealed by Manhattan federal prosecutors Friday.

5

The complaint charges Shakeri, who remains at large, with murder-for-hire, as well as two New York City men in separate assassination plots targeting a prominent Brooklyn journalist who has been a thorn in the side of the Tehran regime and a pair of unidentified Jewish businesspeople.

When Shakeri told his mysterious handler that the Trump plot would “cost a ‘huge’ amount of money,” the Iranian official hinted at other Tehran-backed attempts to murder the former president, the complaint states.

“We already spent a lot of money … [s]o the money’s not an issue,” the official told Shakeri, court papers state.

In a phone conversation with an FBI agent, Shakeri, who did time in US prisons for robbery, said the Iranian official told him Oct. 7 to have a plan in place to kill Trump “within seven days.”

If Shakeri did not meet his deadline, the contact allegedly said the hit on Trump would be postponed until after the Nov. 5 election, because Tehran officials believed that the Republican nominee would lose “and, afterward, it would be easier to assassinate [him].”

5

Shakeri told the FBI he didn’t plan to propose a scheme to murder Trump within the seven days the official had requested, according to the complaint.

The charges were unsealed three days after Trump, 78, defeated Vice President Kamala Harris to become the 47th president-elect. It is the latest example of what officials have described as ongoing efforts by Iran to target Trump and other current and former government officials on US soil.

The feds allege that Islamic Revolutionary Guard officials have been pursuing assassination plots as vengeance for the death of Qasem Soleimani, the head of the country’s elite Quds Force who was killed in a US drone strike ordered by then-President Trump in 2020.

The complaint, which refers to the president-elect as “Victim-4,” also charges Brooklyn native Carlisle Rivera, 49, and Staten Islander Jonathan Loadholt, 36, with murder-for-hire, conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire and money laundering conspiracy.

5

Rivera and Loadholt were ordered held pending trial Thursday by US Magistrate Judge Jennifer Willis. 

Shakeri, who is believed to be in Iran and out of the reach of American justice, is also charged with conspiring to violate US sanctions against Iran, providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization, and conspiracy to the same. 

He spoke with FBI agents by phone five times between late September and as recently as Thursday in hopes of obtaining a sentence reduction for an unnamed person in a US prison, according to the complaint.

5

The complaint details that Shakeri was born in Afghanistan and emigrated to the US as a child, but was deported in 2008 after serving a 14-year prison sentence for robbery. 

During his time behind bars, Shakeri met Rivera and Loadholt, later recruiting them to be hitmen, according to the complaint.

The feds say Shakeri initially tasked his cohorts with killing Iranian American activist and journalist Masih Alinejad, an outspoken critic of the Tehran regime who has been targeted for assassination in the past by Iran. 

5

Rivera and Loadholt pursued Alinejad for nine months, surveilling her Brooklyn home and planning to watch one of her talks at Fairfield University in Connecticut, according to the complaint.

At one point, Rivera allegedly complained to Shakeri: “This b—h is hard to catch, bro.”

Iran offered Shakeri $1.5 million to kill Alinejad and, in turn, he promised Rivera and Loadholt $100,000 to carry out the dastardly deed, the complaint states.

Alinejad is unnamed in the complaint – which largely focused on the alleged assassination plot against her – but has since publicly identified herself as the intended target.

Other would-be targets of the trio included two “Jewish businesspeople residing in New York City,” according to the complaint.

Shakeri claimed Iran’s Revolutionary Guard had provided pictures of both potential victims, which “appeared to come from social media and which indicated [their] support for Israel.”

Shakeri also told the FBI that he had been instructed by Iran to plot a mass shooting targeting Israeli tourists in Sri Lanka — which prompted the US and Israeli governments to issue a travel warning for the island nation on Oct. 23.

“Actors directed by the Government of Iran continue to target our citizens, including President-elect Trump, on US soil and abroad,” Manhattan US Attorney Damian Williams said in a statement Friday. “This has to stop.”

Iran Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei denied that the Islamic republic was involved in the Trump assassination plot. 

Baghaei “described the claims as completely baseless and rejected,” according to a post on X from the Ministry.