Iran Told U.S. That It’s Not Trying to Kill Trump

Iran Told U.S. That It’s Not Trying to Kill Trump

The Biden administration had warned that the United States would consider any Iranian attempt on Mr. Trump’s life to be “an act of war,” officials said.

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By Julian E. Barnes and Farnaz Fassihi

Reporting from Washington and the United Nations

Iran sent a message to the Biden administration in October saying that it was not trying to kill Donald J. Trump, as Tehran attempted to ease rising tensions with Washington, according to U.S. officials, as well as an Iranian official and an analyst.

The message, sent to Washington through an intermediary, came after a note from the Biden administration in September that warned that the United States would consider any Iranian attempt on the life of Mr. Trump, then the Republican candidate for president, to be “an act of war.”

Since Mr. Trump won the Nov. 5 election, many Iranian former officials, pundits and media outlets have been publicly advocating for Tehran to try to engage with the president-elect and pursue a more conciliatory approach, despite vows from Mr. Trump’s allies to renew a high-pressure campaign against Iran.

U.S. officials have said that Iran sought to kill Mr. Trump in revenge for ordering the 2020 drone strike that killed Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, the commander who directed Iran’s militias and proxy forces. The Department of Justice has issued two indictments that officials said were related to Iranian plotting against Mr. Trump.

American officials have also accused Iran of plotting to assassinate other Trump administration figures.

The officials interviewed for this story spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomatic messages.

The message exchange was first reported by The Wall Street Journal.

The message from Iran repeated Tehran’s contention that the killing of General Suleimani was a criminal act, the two U.S. officials said. But it also said that Iran did not want to kill Mr. Trump, according to the U.S. officials, an Iranian official and an Iranian analyst who talks with both sides.

The Iranians said the message to the United States indicated that Iran sought to avenge the killing of General Suleimani through international legal means.

The U.S. officials said the Iranian message was not a letter from a specific official. But the Iranian official and analyst said it was from Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Iran’s mission to the United Nations declined to comment on the message exchange. But it said in a statement that Iran was committed to responding to General Suleimani’s killing “through legal and judicial avenues.”

During the presidential campaign, American officials warned that Iran was plotting to kill Mr. Trump.

Federal prosecutors in Manhattan said last week that Iranian plotters had discussed a plan to assassinate him, which Iran’s Foreign Ministry called baseless.

In July, Asif Raza Merchant, a Pakistani man who had visited Iran, was arrested in New York and was later charged with trying to hire a hit man to assassinate American politicians. Investigators believe his potential targets included Mr. Trump.

Intelligence about Iran’s intentions was provided to the Secret Service, which added counter-sniper teams to Mr. Trump’s protective detail ahead of the assassination attempt on him in July, in Butler, Pa., by a lone gunman with no ties to Tehran, according to U.S. officials.

Iran had considered Mr. Trump to be a difficult target because of his Secret Service protection. But after the attempted assassination in Pennsylvania and another near Mr. Trump’s golf course in Florida, U.S. intelligence agencies assessed that Iran grew more confident that the former president could be successfully targeted.

That assessment of a growing threat, combined with the attempts on Mr. Trump’s life, prompted both an intense security review and a diplomatic campaign to convince Iran that it was making a grave miscalculation, according to officials.

Elon Musk, who has become a close ally of Mr. Trump, met with Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations on Monday, at Mr. Musk’s request, the Iranians said — a sign that it is not only the lame duck Democratic administration that is looking to avoid a direct clash, but also the Trump camp. The Iranians said the meeting with Ambassador Amir Saied Iravani, at a secret location in New York City, was about defusing tensions between Iran and the United States under the Trump administration.

Mr. Musk did not respond to a request for comment.

The United States and Iran have not had official diplomatic relations since Iran’s 1979 revolution, when 52 Americans were taken hostage in the U.S. embassy in Tehran, and held for more than a year.

The Swiss embassy in Tehran is the official diplomatic liaison between the two nations, but American and Iranian officials have held direct and indirect negotiations in recent years on a host of issues, including Iran’s nuclear program, regional tensions and swapping detainees.

The U.S. and Iranian messages were sent through the Swiss, according to the Iranian official and the analyst.