‘Hitman’ Carlisle Rivera hired by Iran to assassinate Donald Trump made shocking threats about killing cops

A man allegedly hired by Iran to assassinate Donald Trump made shocking posts calling for cop killings before his arrest, it has been revealed.

Carlisle Rivera, 49, was named as one of three suspects allegedly tasked with carrying out a plot to kill Trump before the election – before their Iranian handlers delayed the operation, expecting he would lose.

Rivera, one of two held in US custody and charged by the FBI in connection with the plot, wrote on Facebook in 2020: ‘I wish death on the cop who shot that man seven times in front of his kids! These pigs are doing way too much!!! F**k who don’t like what I said!’

In another post, Rivera, a father, threatened to slap a six-year-old and their parents, according to the US Sun. He also claimed he had been banned from Facebook after saying police should ‘be killed themselves’, the outlet reports.

Rivera, a pipe fitter from New York, is accused of plotting to murder Donald Trump with Farhad Shakeri and Jonathan Loadholt on instruction of the feared Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), as revenge for the 2020 killing of Iranian military leader Qassem Soleimani.

Shakeri, pegged as the mastermind behind the plot, has fled to Tehran after confessing to the FBI in recorded phone calls about his involvement. DailyMail.com revealed the 51-year-old from Virginia has five children in the US and a ‘die hard’ MAGA-supporting brother – and has left his ‘peaceful’ family fearing for their lives.

The Justice Department unsealed criminal charges on a thwarted plot by Iran to kill President-elect Donald Trump before the election (pictured November 5)

The three alleged hitmen have been charged over the ‘murder-for-hire’ scheme after FBI foiled the chilling plot just a month before the election.

According to the FBI, the IRGC also tasked Shakeri with carrying out other assassinations against US and Israeli citizens in the United States. 

Rivera and Loadholt were allegedly directed by Shakeri to surveil a U.S. citizen who is an ‘outspoken critic’ of the Iranian regime.

The original target was reportedly Iranian-American human rights activist Masih Alinejad from Brooklyn.

Iranian intelligence planned to kidnap her in 2021 and take her back to Iran for a grim fate, and in July 2022 a man was arrested after staking out her home for two weeks with a loaded AK-47. 

Rivera was allegedly paid $1,000 to target Alinejad, and an extra $500,000 to kill two Jewish businessmen living in the US.

His job was reportedly to tail her while waiting on a $100,000 payment before trying to kill her.

Shakeri told Rivera in a voice note when discussing the murder plot: ‘You just gotta have patience…

‘You gotta wait and have patience to catch her either going in the house or coming out, or following her out somewhere and taking care of it. 

‘Don’t think about going in. In is a suicide move.’ 

But an assassination order for Donald Trump came on the first anniversary of the October 7 Hamas incursion into Israel.

But after being ordered to assassinate Trump with a month before millions of Americans went to the polls on November 5, Shakeri told the FBI he didn’t plan to carry out the operation in the timeframe he was given.

Shakeri – an Afghan refugee granted asylum in America – was deported back to Iran in 2008 after serving a 14-year sentence for armed robbery in New York state prisons.

Rivera was convicted of second-degree murder in 1994 and met the man who allegedly hired him when they were both at Fishkill Correctional Facility in Beacon, New York, in 2005 to 2007

Carlisle Rivera was named as one of three suspects involved in a plot on Trump’s life 

Pictures released by the DOJ show the cache of weapons the suspected hitmen had at their disposal 

Pictures released by the Justice Department after the thwarted attempt on Trump’s life

Trump assassination attempt pictures released by the government

Shakeri previously lived in the US, being brought up in Manassas, Virginia, from the age of nine along with his six siblings after their parents moved the family from Afghanistan for a better life.

He and his American wife had five children and had been living in New York when Shakeri was convicted of robbery and kidnapping in 1994 for which he was handed a 21-year sentence before his deportation to Afghanistan.

Sources told DailyMail.com Shakeri then moved his family to Dubai, before moving on to Turkey and spending time in Afghanistan and Iran over the years. 

His wife and children would return to the US following the couple’s split in 2015.

Shakeri, meanwhile, would be arrested again in 2019 by the Sri Lanka Police Narcotics Bureau (SLPRB) in Colombo, Sri Lanka, in connection with the seizure of approximately 92 kilograms of heroin.

Authorities say Shakeri confessed to the FBI in five separate phone calls over a two-month period that he helped orchestrate a plot to assassinate Trump weeks before the presidential election.

Despite his admissions, Shakeri is still on the loose in Tehran, as Iran does not have an extradition agreement with the US and tensions remain at an all-time high between the two nations.

American authorities therefore have no legal means to order Shakeri to return to the United States or give himself up to face punishment.

But sources say his shocking high-stakes admissions have left his family – who are currently in the US – shell-shocked and ‘terrified’ for their lives.

Shakeri’s younger brother is a huge supporter of Donald Trump and would never have condoned the plot, sources told DailyMail.com, insisting that the rest of the clan were ‘very peaceful.’ 

‘Farhad is just a wild card’, one source said. ‘His entire family are a very peaceful and very loving and kind family. They meet up every week and go to mosque, they are Muslims. 

‘I don’t think they had any idea about any of this. No one can get hold of them at all right now.

‘Farhad is the only one who never really stopped with the bad behavior, but I’m in shock that he could be capable of something like this. His mother will be heartbroken.’

Authorities say Shakeri maintains a web of criminal associates who participate in Tehran’s assassination plots. 

Shakeri told investigators that in September, a contact in Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard instructed him to put together a plan within seven days to watch and ultimately kill Trump, according to a criminal complaint unsealed in federal court in Manhattan.

Shakeri claimed the Iranian official said that ‘we have already spent a lot of money’ and that ‘money’s not an issue’.

Trump rises from the stage with his fist in the air after the assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania, in July

Trump has been a target of Iran assassination threats since he ordered the strike that killed Soleimani, the leader of the brutal Iranian Quds Forces 

Shakeri allegedly paid Rivera and Loadholt $1,000 to surveil Alinejad at a speaking engagement at Fairfield University in Fairfield, Connecticut. This screenshot showed the details for the event, a photo of her, and a money order for $500 to be paid to Rivera

He told investigators the official told him that if he could not put together a plan within the seven-day timeframe, then the plot would be paused until after the election because the official assumed that Mr Trump would lose and that it would be easier to kill him then, the complaint said.

Iran has since rejected the report it was behind the alleged plot to assassinate Trump.

Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei called it a plot by Israel-linked circles to make Iran-US relations more complicated, the official IRNA news agency reported.

Similar accusations in the past were rejected by Iran as their ‘erroneousness’ was proved, he said.

‘Repeat of the accusation in the current time span is a disgusting plot by the Zionist and anti-Iran circles that has aimed at making US-Iran problems more complicated,’ Mr Baghaei said.