The Iranian President denied the Islamic Republic has ever attempted to take the life of incoming President Donald Trump. The FBI charged a man for allegedly playing a role in an Iranian plot to murder the former and future president.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said in an interview with NBC News that aired on Tuesday, “We have never attempted this [the assassination bid on Trump] to begin with and we never will.”
Trump was nearly killed in Pennsylvania in July when Thomas Matthew Crooks shot him in the ear. Two months later, Ryan Wesley Routh attempted to shoot Trump on a golf course in Florida. Tehran was not involved in either plot.
In November, the Department of Justice charged Farhad Shakeri for working with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps to kill Trump. The case relies on Shakeri’s testimony and the charging documents concede that he is a liar.
Subsequent to the attempts on Trump’s life, his campaign claimed the former president was informed by the US intelligence community “regarding real and specific threats from Iran to assassinate him in an effort to destabilize and sow chaos in the United States.”
During his first term in office, Trump significantly escalated tensions with Tehran by abandoning the Iran Nuclear Agreement and placing sanctions on Iran designed to cripple the nation’s economy.
During Trump’s final year in office, the US and the Islamic Republic almost entered into a direct war after Trump ordered the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, Iran’s top general, while he was on a diplomatic mission in Baghdad. Tehran responded with a missile strike targeting a US base in Iraq.
A war between Iran and the US is still possible during Trump’s second administration. Axios reported earlier this month that there is a “real possibility” that Iran’s nuclear facilities could be bombed after Trump returns to the White House.
Pezeshkian said that Iran’s nuclear program is peaceful and Tehran does not seek war with Washington. On Friday, CIA Director William Burns reaffirmed that Iran is not attempting to make a nuclear weapon.
