The United States has been actively engaged in war with Iran since Feb. 28, 2026, and President Donald Trump’s standing orders to “obliterate” the country if he were ever assassinated — instructions he announced in February 2025 that many dismissed as empty rhetoric — now appear less like a hypothetical threat and more like a blueprint already being executed.
The officials who publicly vowed to kill Trump are dead. An operative Tehran dispatched to carry out an assassination scheme has been found guilty in federal court. And the ceasefire intended to halt the fighting is, according to Trump himself, on “massive life support.”
A Convicted Assassin and the Plot That Failed
On March 7, 2026, a federal jury in New York found Asif Merchant guilty of murder for hire and attempting to commit an act of terrorism transcending national boundaries. The 47-year-old Pakistani national, trained by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), admitted at trial that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard sent him to the United States in 2024 to arrange political assassinations, explicitly naming Trump as a target. Authorities disrupted the plot before any attack could occur. Merchant is awaiting sentencing and could face life in prison.
Following the March 7, 2026 verdict, former Attorney Gen. Pamela Bondi said of the verdict: “This man landed on American soil hoping to kill President Trump — instead, he was met with the might of American law enforcement.” Prosecutors presented an undercover video in the Brooklyn courtroom showing Merchant describing the scheme, placing a vape pen on a napkin to represent his target and asking: “This is the target. How will it die?”
The Man Who Threatened Trump Is Dead
As U.S. and Israeli military operations against Iran escalated, Ali Larijani, then-head of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council and among the most influential officials in the Islamic Republic’s clerical leadership, issued a direct threat to Trump on March 10, 2026. In a post on X, he wrote: “The freedom-loving nation of Iran is not afraid of your hollow threats. Even those who were mightier than you have failed to destroy the Iranian nation. Watch yourself — or you’ll be eliminated.”
The statement, signed by the Supreme National Security Council, came after Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei died on Feb. 28 — the opening day of the joint U.S.-Israeli assault on Iran. Larijani had also publicly declared on national television that he would hold Trump personally accountable for the supreme leader’s death. Trump dismissed the threat in a March 2026 interview with CBS News, saying he “couldn’t care less.”
Larijani was killed March 17-18, 2026. Israel announced on March 17-18, 2026, that it had killed him along with Gholam Reza Soleimani, the head of Iran’s Basij militia. Iranian authorities confirmed both deaths. The official who most openly threatened to kill Trump had been eliminated — a stark demonstration of what Trump meant when he warned that those targeting him would be obliterated.
Years of Iranian Plotting and a Warning Made Real
Trump’s contingency directive for retaliation did not emerge from nowhere. It stemmed from years of documented Iranian assassination efforts targeting him — a campaign rooted in January 2020, when Trump authorized the drone strike in Baghdad that killed Iranian Gen. Qasem Soleimani, the commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ (IRGC) Quds Force. Senior Iranian officials have publicly and repeatedly vowed revenge since then, identifying Trump and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo as targets.
Trump’s security detail has regarded those threats as credible for years. Following the second assassination attempt against Trump in Florida in 2024 — which had no connection to Iran — his security team was so concerned about the Iranian threat that they arranged for Trump to travel to an event on a decoy plane owned by Steve Witkoff. The Justice Department has documented multiple alleged Iranian conspiracies against Trump and other former officials, including a 2022 plot targeting former National Security Adviser John Bolton.
In February 2025, Trump signed a sweeping executive order targeting Iran and issued a warning: he had left standing instructions for the country to be “obliterated” if he was ever assassinated. “I’ve left instructions. If they do it, they get obliterated; there won’t be anything left,” Trump declared at the signing ceremony.
Targeting the Assassination Network
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth confirmed that the commander of the Iranian unit responsible for a previous assassination attempt on Trump had been killed in U.S. military strikes. “Iran tried to kill President Trump, and President Trump got the last laugh,” Hegseth announced. Trump addressed the killing on March 2, saying: “I got him before he got me. They tried twice. Well, I got him first.” Though Hegseth did not identify the individual by name, Israeli reporter Amit Segal identified him as Rahman Mokadam, the head of the IRGC’s special operations division.
A Fragile Truce Under Threat
On April 8, 2026, Trump announced a two-week ceasefire after Iran agreed to allow safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz. The arrangement, facilitated with Pakistan’s help, was presented by the White House as a potential opening for broader negotiations. Vice President JD Vance, Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner traveled to Islamabad to conduct direct talks with Iranian representatives.
The pause has since deteriorated. Iran has been accused of imposing fees on tankers transiting the Strait — a violation, according to Trump, of the agreed terms. By mid-May, Trump declared the ceasefire “on massive life support” after dismissing Tehran’s latest counterproposal as “totally unacceptable.” Negotiations have since advanced toward a draft 60-day memorandum of understanding that would formally extend the ceasefire and open talks on Iran’s nuclear program — but as of June 1, Trump had sent the document back to Iran demanding firmer nuclear commitments. On June 2, Secretary of State Marco Rubio told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that Iran must commit to disposing of its highly enriched uranium and agree to severe, long-term limits on enrichment before any deal moves forward.
Whether it concludes through diplomacy or renewed combat, the February 2025 warning has shifted from deterrent to description of what has already happened.