{"id":1490004,"date":"2022-05-24T13:29:39","date_gmt":"2022-05-24T17:29:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1490004"},"modified":"2022-05-24T13:29:48","modified_gmt":"2022-05-24T17:29:48","slug":"fbi-says-they-uncovered-isis-plot-to-assassinate-george-w-bush-in-dallas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/fbi-says-they-uncovered-isis-plot-to-assassinate-george-w-bush-in-dallas\/","title":{"rendered":"FBI Says They Uncovered ISIS Plot to Assassinate George W. Bush in Dallas"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">26<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Ffbi-says-they-uncovered-isis-plot-to-assassinate-george-w-bush-in-dallas%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1490004&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imageio.forbes.com\/specials-images\/imageserve\/\/628cc08f78d92b330359856e\/0x0.jpg?format=jpg&#038;width=1200\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" alt=\"image\" \/><\/div>\n<div class=\"article-sharing social-icons\">\n<ul class=\"article-sharing__container vertical-icons\">\n<li class=\"article-sharing__item spacing\"><a class=\"social-icon color-change facebook\" aria-label=\"Share Facebook\" data-ga-track=\"Facebook Click\"><span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Share to Facebook<\/span><\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"article-sharing__item spacing\"><a class=\"social-icon color-change twitter\" aria-label=\"Share Twitter\" data-ga-track=\"Twitter Click\"><span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Share to Twitter<\/span><\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"article-sharing__item spacing\"><a class=\"social-icon color-change linkedin\" aria-label=\"Share Linkedin\" data-ga-track=\"Linkedin Click\"><span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Share to Linkedin<\/span><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<hr class=\"embed-base rule-embed color-accent border-solid weight-light\" \/>\n<h2 class=\"subhead-embed color-accent bg-base font-accent font-size text-align\"><em>Two confidential informants and surveillance of the alleged plotter\u2019s WhatsApp account reveal plans to smuggle assassins into the U.S. to murder the former president, according to a search warrant application discovered by <\/em>Forbes<em>.<\/em><\/h2>\n<div class=\"article_paragraph_2\"><\/div>\n<hr class=\"embed-base rule-embed color-accent border-solid weight-light\" \/>\n<p>An Iraqi man in the U.S. accused of being an ISIS operative was plotting to kill George W. Bush, going so far as to travel to Dallas in November to take video around the former president\u2019s home and recruiting a team of compatriots he hoped to smuggle into the country over the Mexican border, according to an FBI search-warrant application filed March 23 and unsealed this week in the Southern District of Ohio.<\/p>\n<div id=\"halfway_hardwall_1\"><\/div>\n<p>The FBI said it uncovered the scheme through the work of two confidential informants and surveillance of the alleged plotter\u2019s account on the Meta-owned WhatsApp messaging platform. The suspect, based in Columbus, Ohio, said he wanted to assassinate Bush because he felt the former president was responsible for killing many Iraqis and breaking apart the country after the 2003 U.S. military invasion, according to the warrant. <\/p>\n<div id=\"halfway_hardwall_2\"><\/div>\n<p>The case shows how federal investigators continue to monitor threats from ISIS even as the group has been severely weakened by American intelligence and military operations in recent years. It also shows how the FBI, despite its claims of being prevented from investigating major crimes because of Meta and other tech providers\u2019 use of encryption, has been able to work around WhatsApp security by using old-school policing with sourcing of informants and tracking the metadata they can get from the messaging company.<\/p>\n<div id=\"halfway_hardwall_3\"><\/div>\n<figure class=\"embed-base image-embed embed-1\" role=\"presentation\">\n<div class=\"image-embed__placeholder\"><\/div><figcaption>\n<p class=\"color-body light-text\">A snippet from the search warrant uncovered by Forbes detailing the plot on George W. Bush&#8217;s life. The name of the suspect has been redacted.<\/p>\n<p>  <small class=\"color-body light-text\">Forbes screenshot<\/small><br \/>\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The alleged plot organizer is an Iraqi national who\u2019d been in the U.S. since 2020 and had an asylum application pending, according to the FBI\u2019s search-warrant application. Federal agents used two different confidential sources to investigate the plot, one who claimed to offer assistance obtaining false immigration and identification documents, the second a purported customer of the alleged people smuggler, who was willing to pay thousands of dollars to bring his family into the country.<\/p>\n<div id=\"halfway_hardwall_4\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"article_paragraph_7\"><\/div>\n<p>(As no charges have been filed against the suspect, <em>Forbes<\/em> is publishing neither his name nor the full warrant. It\u2019s unclear if he has been arrested. The Department of Justice hadn\u2019t provided comment at the time of publication.)<\/p>\n<p>Freddy Ford, chief of staff for the Office of George W. Bush, said, \u201cPresident Bush has all the confidence in the world in the United States Secret Service and our law enforcement and intelligence communities.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In November 2021, the suspect revealed to the FBI insider the plot to assassinate Bush and asked the confidential source if he knew how to \u201cobtain replica or fraudulent police and\/or FBI identifications and badges\u201d to help carry out the killing, and whether it was possible to smuggle the plotters out of the country the same way they came in after their mission was complete, according to the warrant. The alleged smuggler said he also wanted to find and assassinate a former Iraqi general who helped Americans during the war and whom he believed was living under a fictitious identity in the U.S., investigators said.<\/p>\n<p>The alleged plotter claimed to be part of a unit called \u201cAl-Raed,\u201d meaning \u201cThunder,\u201d that was led by a former Iraqi pilot for Saddam Hussein who had been based out of Qatar until his recent death, the warrant said. As many as seven members of the group would be sent to the U.S. to kill President Bush, according to a conversation described in the warrant, and the suspect\u2019s job was \u201cto locate and conduct surveillance on former president Bush\u2019s residences and\/or offices and obtain firearms and vehicles to use in the assassination.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After traveling to Dallas with the informant to take video of Bush\u2019s residence, the accused took more footage at the George W. Bush Institute, according to federal agents. The Texas city was the site of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963.<\/p>\n<p>Bush, a Republican who was in the news last week when he inadvertently referred to the U.S. invasion of Iraq in a speech about the Russian invasion of Ukraine, was president from 2001 to 2009.<\/p>\n<p>In one conversation with a confidential FBI source, the suspect said he was planning to get four Iraqi national males located in Iraq, Turkey, Egypt and Denmark into the U.S., according to the warrant. In a later conversation, he claimed that one of the four was \u201cthe secretary of an ISIS financial minister,\u201d the FBI said. The alleged smuggler described the men as \u201cformer Baath Party members in Iraq who did not agree with the current Iraqi government and were political exiles,\u201d the FBI said. He was planning to charge each $15,000 to be smuggled into America, the FBI said. The Baath Party was the political organization of Hussein, who was deposed in the 2003 U.S. invasion.<\/p>\n<p>His plan, according to the warrant, was to get Mexican visitor visas for the ISIS operatives, using passport information he would send to the informant over WhatsApp, before getting them over the border. Meanwhile, he was communicating with a contact in Egypt over a fake Facebook profile, which carried a profile picture of two individual hands each holding a rose, designed to look romantic and \u201cnot suspicious,\u201d according to the FBI\u2019s account. In 2021, the FBI got a warrant to search that Facebook account, though it\u2019s unclear what they obtained.<\/p>\n<p>Seamus Hughes, deputy director of the Program on Extremism at George Washington University, told <em>Forbes, \u201c<\/em>It\u2019s clear this was a sophisticated counterterrorism operation with a lot of moving parts. It was both far reaching and unique in its targeting.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt also shows that while the debate on so called \u201cgoing dark\u201d can be overcome through the use of undercover operatives, it\u2019s labor intensive but possible.\u201d The term \u201cgoing dark\u201d is used by law enforcement to describe the inability to get to data that has been encrypted by software applications.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAlso, we haven\u2019t seen a plot of this scale in a number of years. It shows that while domestic terrorism rightly takes a good amount of counterterrorism focus, the threats are not there alone.\u201d<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"subhead3-embed color-body bg-base font-accent font-size text-align\"><strong>Spying on ISIS via WhatsApp and mobile location<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>As part of its surveillance of the alleged plotters, the FBI recently received permission to acquire mobile location information from AT&#038;T. It had already used what\u2019s known as a \u201cpen register\u201d on the WhatsApp account believed to belong to the chief suspect, helping them determine how often the account was used, what numbers it was contacting and whether or not it was active.<\/p>\n<p>While the suspect seemed convinced his WhatsApp account was secure, he was unaware that investigators could see every message sent to the confidential sources. Nor was he aware that starting in October he was using a phone that he was given by the informant at the FBI\u2019s request. The informant noted that the target was a keen user of WhatsApp and was a member of Baath and ISIS chat groups on the app. In another conversation with an informant, the suspect claimed to have \u201cbeen in recent communications with a friend in Qatar who was a former minister in Iraq under Saddam Hussein who had access to large quantities of money\u201d and was messaging him over WhatsApp, the FBI said.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"embed-base image-embed embed-2\" role=\"presentation\">\n<div class=\"image-embed__placeholder\"><\/div><figcaption>\n<p class=\"color-body light-text\">A mysterious group known as Al-Raed was allegedly plotting to kill former President George W. Bush, according to an FBI search warrant, shown here in redacted form.<\/p>\n<p>  <small class=\"color-body light-text\">Forbes screenshot<\/small><br \/>\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>While the sources were passing on what they learned over WhatsApp throughout 2021 and 2022, they were also secretly recording the in-person meetings with the alleged plotter in which additional startling details were revealed, according to the FBI. In one conversation from December, according to the warrant, the suspect claimed to have had just smuggled two individuals associated with Hezbollah \u2014 a terrorist organization, according to the U.S. \u2014 into the U.S. for a fee of $50,000 each.<\/p>\n<p>Also in the FBI court filing, the alleged plotter claimed to be a member of \u201cthe resistance\u201d and had killed many Americans in Iraq between 2003 and 2006, packing vehicles with explosives and detonating them when U.S. soldiers were near.<\/p>\n<div class=\"newsletter_signup_article\"><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Share to FacebookShare to TwitterShare to Linkedin Two confidential informants and surveillance of the alleged plotter\u2019s WhatsApp account reveal plans to smuggle assassins into the U.S. to murder the former<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":498,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1490004","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1490004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/498"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1490004"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1490004\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1490004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1490004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1490004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}