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Florida Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz said during a Thursday interview that a Homeland Security Department official told him five “assassination teams” are targeting President Donald Trump.
Gaetz shared the shocking details during an interview on the Real America’s Voice show “Human Events Daily” with John Solomon.
“I had a senior official from the Department of Homeland Security in my office before the second assassination attempt, saying that what he has assessed is that there are five known assassination teams in the United States, three inspired by other governments, two that are here, that are known domestic assassination teams,” Gaetz said during the interview.
“And with that, this individual was coming to me, concerned that the force protection around President Trump, even prior to that second assassination attempt, was not sufficient for what it needed to be, and the coordination at that level, at the dignitary protection level is like the bare minimum that we have to do to keep our presidents, our presidential candidates, safe while they’re on the trail,” he continued.
“Five teams that we know are targeting Trump,” he added. “And so that raises real questions about why certain teams were being pulled off of the Trump deal detail and put on, for example, the Jill Biden detail.”
The congressman noted that the information was given to him shortly before the second assassination attempt against Trump on Sunday. It is uncertain whether Sunday’s suspect, Ryan Routh, was one of the five teams in the information the Homeland Security official shared.
In addition to the two assassination attempts against Trump in Pennsylvania in July and Sunday’s attempt in Florida, a Pakistani man was charged in an assassination plot with Iran. Asif Merchant was arrested on July 12, just one day before the shooting during the Butler rally.
Merchant was indicted last week with “attempting to commit an act of terrorism transcending national boundaries and murder-for-hire as part of a scheme to assassinate a politician or U.S. government official on U.S. soil.”
Attorney General Merrick Garland issued a statement alongside the news of Merchant’s indictment.
“The Justice Department will not tolerate Iran’s efforts to target our country’s public officials and endanger our national security,” said Garland.
“As these terrorism and murder for hire charges against Asif Merchant demonstrate, we will continue to hold accountable those who would seek to carry out Iran’s lethal plotting against Americans,” he added.
