Even as tensions flare anew between Israel and Iran's proxies and amid anticipation of a major Iranian attack on Israel, Tehran's desire to attack former President Donald Trump has become clearer. We now know it hacked his campaign and plotted his assassination. This is not just a threat to Trump. That a foreign adversary would even consider killing on American soil the previous and possibly next U.S. president indicates how weak they perceive the United States to be. Reestablishing U.S. deterrence requires a strong, and direct, response.
The FBI just announced that Iran was responsible for hacking the Trump campaign as part of a plot to disrupt the campaign.
More worrying is that Iran was actively working toward killing Trump. The FBI has arrested and charged a Pakistani man who traveled to Iran before returning to the United States and trying to hire a hitman to kill someone with a security detail who had hurt the Muslim world. It is quite likely Trump was the intended target. The Secret Service took the threat seriously enough to increase Trump's security. Moreover, Iran has a history of plotting—and carrying out—violent attacks in the United States, including against former senior officials using similar methodology.
Iran tried to hire a Mexican cartel in 2011 to kill the Saudi ambassador to Washington by bombing a popular Washington, DC, restaurant. More recently, Iran sought revenge against former Trump administration officials and U.S. military leaders involved in the January 2020 strike that killed Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani. It tried to find a hitman to kill former Trump National Security Advisor John Bolton for $300,000.
But government officials have not been the only targets of Iranian plots. In 2023, three men were arrested for taking money to kill Masih Alinejad, a vocal human rights critic of the Iranian regime and an American citizen. One of the men was found with a loaded AK-47 outside Alinejad's New York City home.
As concerning as these prior plots are, Iran's attempt to assassinate a former president and current presidential candidate rises to a new level of brazenness. It demonstrates how American weakness has emboldened Tehran to pursue reckless actions.
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Iran has flourished under the Biden-Harris administration. Iran oil exports have jumped from about 500,000 barrels per day in late 2020 to about 2 million barrels per day today. Billions in Iranian financial reserves have been unfrozen in banks and accessed by Tehran. Tehran's nuclear program has expanded unimpeded.
Meanwhile, Iran has grown more reckless. Witness its unprecedented firing of more than 300 missiles and drones against Israel on April 13 and its plot against Trump. Now, Iran is again threatening another major attack on Israel.
The administration has done little, beyond defensive action, to confront this intensification of Iranian aggression. After first embracing Israel after Oct. 7, the administration has since softened its support in response to pressure from its progressive base. While it admirably helped defend Israel on April 13, it is now preaching de-escalation as Israel faces major threats from Iran and Hezbollah.
The Biden-Harris administration has also been weak in responding to Iranian proxy attacks on U.S. forces. Our organization, JINSA, has tracked 263 attacks on U.S. forces in the Middle East since Biden became president—87 before Hamas's barbaric Oct. 7 attack on Israel and 176 since. The most recent came on Aug. 5, just days before news of the plotter's arrest. The administration has meekly responded with just 17 rounds of airstrikes, usually against unmanned facilities with the only exception being when three U.S. troops were killed.
The story has been much the same in the Red Sea, where Iran's Houthi proxy have effectively shut down commercial shipping and the United States has responded with sporadic strikes against low-value targets. Unsurprisingly, the Houthis continue launching missiles and drones at passing ships.
Nor has the administration, as Rep. Mike Turner (R-OH) recently pointed out, taken any action to hold Iran responsible for the assassination plot and hack against Trump.
Tehran will only grow bolder and more reckless unless the United States takes action to reassert deterrence and change Iran's calculus. It should start by directly punishing Iran for daring to plot against a U.S. president and other former senior U.S. officials.
Biden would demonstrate strong leadership by hitting back hard, inside Iran, against senior Iranian military personnel and/or hard military assets. His Democratic predecessor, Bill Clinton, fired cruise missiles against Iraq's Intelligence Services in 1993, after Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein tried to assassinate former President George H.W. Bush in Kuwait. It wasn't the model for a forceful retaliation, but at least it was direct.
A strong U.S. response, now at this crucial moment, would also do more to dissuade a major Iranian attack on Israel than current U.S. appeals for calm.
And this isn't just about Iran. America's Chinese, Russian, and North Korean adversaries are watching how we respond to brazen plots and attacks against America to determine what they can get away with.
For the sake of American lives, national security interests, and to prevent future conflict, the United States must send a strong message inside Iran.
Michael Makovsky, a former Pentagon official, is president and CEO of the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA). Blaise Misztal is JINSA's vice president for policy.
The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.
