Iran’s assassination threats against Donald Trump have loomed over the president in recent days and are more serious than publicly reported, an upcoming book claims.
Axios reporter Isaac Isenstadt’s upcoming book, “Revenge: The Inside Story of Trump’s Return to Power,” claims that law enforcement officials warned Trump in 2024 that Iran had placed operatives in the U.S. with access to surface-to-air missiles and that Trump’s orbit worried Iran would try to take out “Trump Force One” as it was taking off or landing while on the campaign trail. Isenstadt previewed his book in an Axios article published Sunday.
The reported threats and concern of Iran’s threats against Trump hit a fever pitch in September 2024, when a second assassination attempt was thwarted at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida, the book claims. Isenstadt reported that his book is based on his conversations with Trump’s “inner circle during his campaign.”
Fast-forward to Trump’s second presidency in 2025, the 47th president already has issued stern warnings against Iran. Trump said while signing an executive order imposing maximum pressure on Tehran earlier in February that he left special instructions if something were to happen to him.
During his first term in the Oval Office, Trump withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, also known as the Iran nuclear deal, and reapplied crippling economic sanctions on Iran, escalating tensions between Trump and the nation.
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Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President Donald Trump (Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/West Asia News Agency | Elizabeth Frantz/Reuters)
“That would be a terrible thing for them to do,” Trump said on Feb. 4 of Iran potentially attempting to assassinate him. “If they did that, they would be obliterated. That would be the end.… There won’t be anything left.”
Trump survived two assassination attempts while on the campaign trail in 2024, including the Pennsylvania attempt that left him with an injury to his ear as suspect Thomas Crooks opened fire on the crowd of Trump supporters in July. The Pennsylvania attempt has not been connected to Iran.
The suspect behind the Florida attempt, Ryan Wesley Routh, wrote a book in 2023 urging Iran to assassinate Trump, the Associated Press reported in September 2024.
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Following the second attempt in Florida, Isenstadt’s book, which will be released March 18, claims Trump’s team was on high alert, including his security detail putting Trump on a “Trump Force One” decoy plane owned by Steve Witkoff to travel to an event shortly after the attempt. The co-chairs of the campaign at the time, current chief of staff Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita, split up, with Wiles traveling with Trump on the decoy plane and LaCivita on Trump Force One.
“The boss ain’t riding with us today,” LaCivita reportedly told staffers on the flight. “We had to put him into another plane. This is nothing but a sort of test for how things may happen in the future.”
Staffers on Trump Force One reportedly worried they would be “collateral damage” if the plane had been taken down, the book alleges.
Three aides told Isenstadt that the flight was packed with “gallows humor galore” as staffers reportedly realized the severity of an alleged threat, dubbing the trip as the “Ghost Flight” and remarking the alleged threat was “some serious s—.”
Frmer President Donald Trump is rushed offstage after being shot during a rally on July 13, 2024, in Butler, Pennsylvania. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
Fox News Digital reached out to the White House for comment on the excerpts from Isenstadt’s book, but did not immediately receive a reply.
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Trump’s campaign continued to face reported threats and scares following the second assassination attempt, including the Secret Service warning that a person might attempt to shoot at Trump’s motorcade after a Long Island rally on Sept. 18, 2024. In a separate incident, Secret Service agents shot a drone with an electromagnetic gun from a sunroof in one of the cars in Trump’s motorcade during a Pennsylvania campaign trip in September 2024, the book claimed.
Former President Donald Trump is assisted by the Secret Service agents in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13, 2024. (Brendan McDermid/Reuters)
“Don’t f—ing hang out the window and take photos, because you’re a f—ing target,” LaCivita reportedly told longtime Trump advisor Dan Scavino during one trip on Trump Force One.
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Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said in January that his country “never” plotted to assassinate Trump, adding “we never will.”
The Justice Department announced in November 2024 that it thwarted an Iranian attempt to assassinate Trump, charging an alleged Iranian government asset in the murder-for-hire plot.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said in January that his country “never” plotted to assassinate Trump, adding “we never will.” (Iranian Presidency/Handout/Anadolu via Getty Images)
As for the two assassination attempts during the campaign cycle, Trump instructed the Secret Service to hand over “every bit of information” related to the Florida and Pennsylvania incidents, he told the New York Post recently, arguing the Biden administration held back details.
“I want to find out about the two assassins,” the president told the New York Post Friday. “Why did the one guy have six cellphones, and why did the other guy have [foreign] apps?”
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“I’m entitled to know. And they held it back long enough,” he continued, referring to the Biden administration’s handling of information on the attempts. “No more excuses.”
Fox News Digital’s Alexandra Koch, Diana Stancy and Anders Hagstrom contributed to this report.
