A Pakistani who was arrested earlier this year for allegedly plotting to assassinate current and former U.S. government officials, he now faces terrorism charges, according to an indictment filed Tuesday in federal court.
Merchant was originally charged in July with a single count of murder for hire, in a criminal complaint that said he traveled to the United States to “recruit individuals to carry out his conspiracy to assassinate United States government officials.” A new two-count indictment unsealed Tuesday in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York reiterated the murder for hire charge and added a count accusing Merchant of attempting to commit an act of terrorism.
The 46-year-old, who is believed to have links to Iran, is “trying[ed] “killing a person in the United States” who was either “a member of the uniformed services” or “an official” of the U.S. government, the indictment says in describing the new charge.
Neither the original complaint nor the new indictment mention Merchant’s alleged targets. Investigators have said he planned to tell his co-conspirators whom he would attack later in the summer. But multiple sources familiar with the investigation told CBS News last month that Merchant planned to assassinate current and former government officials across the political spectrum. Merchant had not yet finalized the plan, but former President Donald Trump was among the possible targets, the sources said.
Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa said last week that his office had received detailed intelligence that President Biden and former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley were also potential targets.
Details about Merchant’s alleged ties to Iran remain scarce. Charging documents filed earlier this year said he had “a wife and children in Iran” and that records “indicate frequent travel to Iran, Syria and Iraq.” He traveled to Iran in April 2024, the complaint said, before traveling to the United States.
According to investigators, he then met an unnamed accomplice who became an FBI informant in New York. The two began a relationship that lasted several months, with Merchant eventually revealing his plans, according to charging documents.
According to prosecutors, Merchant sketched out the plot on a napkin in his New York hotel room and told the man “there would be ‘security all around’ the person” they planned to kill.
The individual, whose name has not been released, arranged a meeting between Merchant and two secret agents he believed to be hit men. “During the meeting, Merchant identified himself as the ‘representative’ in the United States, indicating that he was working for others outside the United States,” prosecutors wrote.
According to the criminal complaint, Merchant told the men he would provide further instructions on the alleged plot “either during the last week of August 2024 or the first week of September 2024,” including the name of the target.
Federal authorities arrested him in July ahead of a planned trip abroad. During a search, investigators said they found a handwritten note containing passwords for various aspects of the plot.
Merchant remained in custody and has pleaded not guilty to the original charge. He has not yet been arraigned on the updated charge. His attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Information about Merchant’s alleged plot figures prominently in intelligence that has prompted the U.S. Secret Service to beef up security around the former president in recent months, people familiar with the investigation told CBS News. Merchant was arrested a day before the July 13 assassination attempt on Trump in Pennsylvania, but authorities have said there is no indication his alleged attack plan was connected to that shooting.
“Law enforcement disrupted the plot before any attack could be carried out. Our ongoing investigation has not found any evidence that this defendant (Merchant) had any connection to the Butler, Pennsylvania, shooting,” a law enforcement official said in a statement to CBS News last month.
U.S. intelligence and law enforcement officials, including FBI Director Christopher Wray, have investigated numerous threats made by Iran against politicians and government officials since the early 1980s. Assassination of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani during the Trump administration.
“The Department of Justice will not tolerate Iran’s efforts to target our nation’s public officials and endanger our national security,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement Wednesday.
Nicole Sganga and
contributed to this report.
