Trump campaign: US intelligence warned of death threats from Iran

Donald Trump has been informed by US intelligence about death threats from Iran against him, his campaign team said.

The Republican presidential candidate had been “informed of real and concrete threats from Iran to assassinate him in order to destabilize the United States and create chaos,” the campaign team said in a statement.

The allegations were not further detailed and it was not immediately clear whether the threats mentioned were new or had been reported before.

The Iranian government did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but Tehran had previously rejected U.S. accusations of interference in American affairs.

On the social media portal X (formerly Twitter), Trump posted that there were “serious death threats against me from Iran.”

“Iran has already tried things that didn't work, but it will try again.”

An attack on him would be a “death wish of the attacker,” he said, and thanked Congress for approving additional funding for the Secret Service.

“Intelligence officials have determined that these sustained and coordinated attacks have increased in recent months,” Steven Cheung, communications director for Trump's campaign, said in the statement.

“Law enforcement officials from all agencies are working to ensure President Trump is protected and the election takes place without interference,” he added.

The BBC has contacted the Office of the Director of National Intelligence in the United States for comment.

This comes after Trump survived an assassination attempt on July 13 in which he was injured and another person was killed in a shooting at a rally in Pennsylvania. The motive has not yet been determined and the investigation is ongoing.

In the days that followed, US media reported that authorities had received intelligence about an alleged Iranian plot against the former president. Iranian authorities dismissed the allegations at the time as “malicious,” reported the BBC's US partner, CBS News.

“If they do assassinate President Trump, which is always a possibility, I hope America will wipe Iran out and erase it from the face of the earth. If that doesn't happen, American leaders will be seen as 'cowardly' cowards!” Trump wrote at the time on his Truth Social platform.

On September 15, a Secret Service agent discovered a rifle lodged in a fence at the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach. The agent opened fire as Trump was playing a round of golf.

US prosecutors file charges against Ryan Wesley Routha man arrested near the golf course for the attempted murder of a presidential candidate.

There is no indication that Iran was involved in either case.

Last month, the Trump team said part of the internal communication was hacked and suggested that it was the target of Iranian agents.

In 2022, a member of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps was charged by the United States with plotting the assassination of Trump's former National Security Advisor John Bolton.

The US Justice Department said Shahram Poursafi attempted to pay individuals in the US $300,000 (£224,000) to carry out the assassination in revenge for the US strike that killed Iranian military commander Qasem Soleimani.