{"id":87393,"date":"2024-08-07T10:08:52","date_gmt":"2024-08-07T10:08:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/?p=87393"},"modified":"2024-08-07T10:08:52","modified_gmt":"2024-08-07T10:08:52","slug":"white-house-denies-pakistani-citizen-asif-merchants-involvement-in-bid-on-trump","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2024\/87393\/","title":{"rendered":"White House denies Pakistani citizen Asif Merchant&#8217;s involvement in &#8216;bid on Trump&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Washington (National Times) The White House has denied involvement of Pakistani citizen Asif Merchant in plot to assassinate former United States president Donald Trump.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre said late on Tuesday that \u201cAsif Merchant has nothing to do with the attempt on [Donald] Trump&#8217;s life.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Trump had on July 13, 2024, survived an assassination attempt while speaking at an open-air campaign rally near Butler, Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The US Department of Justice quoted Asif Merchant as saying that he is a Pakistani citizen and lives in Pakistan. He has two wives \u2013 a wife and children live in Pakistan and the second in Iran.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Earlier, the Department of Justice claimed that Asif was involved in plot on the life of former president and Republican presidential nominee Trump as he \u201cpaid for murder.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">According to the Department of Justice, Asif had travelled to Iran, Syria and Iraq several times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Meanwhile, the document presented in New York&#8217;s Brooklyn Federal Court did not name a target of Merchant. However, it was presumed that Trump was his target for \u201cordering drone attack on Iranian Revolutionary Guards&#8217; top commander Qassem Soleimani in 2020.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It has been claimed that Trump&#8217;s security was tightened in recent weeks by the Secret Service due to knowledge of the Merchant plot. It is also claimed that he launched the plot in April when he came to the US to \u201chire assassins\u201d to kill the US government officials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">However, there is no evidence that Asif was involved in the attempted assassination of Trump in Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Asif is currently in the custody of US authorities in New York and is being prosecuted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>PAKISTAN FOREIGN OFFICE<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Foreign Office, in the meanwhile, has said that Islamabad is in touch with the American authorities and awaiting details.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Foreign Office Spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra-Baloch said she had seen media reports regarding arrest of Asif Merchant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">She said the Foreign Office had been verifying information about Asif before giving an official response.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A Pakistani man with alleged ties to Iran has been charged in the United States in connection with a foiled plot to assassinate a US politician or government officials, the Justice Department said on Tuesday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Washington (National Times) The White House has denied involvement of Pakistani citizen Asif Merchant in plot to assassinate former United States president Donald Trump. White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre said late on Tuesday that \u201cAsif Merchant has nothing to do with the attempt on [Donald] Trump&#8217;s life.\u201d Trump had on July 13, 2024, survived an [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":87394,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-87393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international","entry"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>White House denies Pakistani citizen Asif Merchant&#039;s involvement in &#039;bid on Trump&#039; - Nation<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2024\/87393\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"White House denies Pakistani citizen Asif Merchant&#039;s involvement in &#039;bid on Trump&#039; - Nation\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Washington (National Times) The White House has denied involvement of Pakistani citizen Asif Merchant in plot to assassinate former United States president Donald Trump. White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre said late on Tuesday that \u201cAsif Merchant has nothing to do with the attempt on [Donald] Trump&#8217;s life.\u201d Trump had on July 13, 2024, survived an [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2024\/87393\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Nation\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2024-08-07T10:08:52+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Untitled-1-copy-98.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"670\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"370\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"humza Jahangir\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"humza Jahangir\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2024\/87393\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2024\/87393\/\",\"name\":\"White House denies Pakistani citizen Asif Merchant's involvement in 'bid on Trump' - Nation\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2024\/87393\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2024\/87393\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Untitled-1-copy-98.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2024-08-07T10:08:52+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#\/schema\/person\/27efa35fa76e99f3ad7e7397d7332c16\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2024\/87393\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2024\/87393\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2024\/87393\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Untitled-1-copy-98.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Untitled-1-copy-98.jpg\",\"width\":670,\"height\":370},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2024\/87393\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"White House denies Pakistani citizen Asif Merchant&#8217;s involvement in &#8216;bid on Trump&#8217;\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/\",\"name\":\"Nation\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#\/schema\/person\/27efa35fa76e99f3ad7e7397d7332c16\",\"name\":\"humza Jahangir\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/43feedd99bd6a90080d1621b7e6604364acb673ee979d3ffe5075557c14c68b9?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/43feedd99bd6a90080d1621b7e6604364acb673ee979d3ffe5075557c14c68b9?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"humza Jahangir\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/author\/humza\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"White House denies Pakistani citizen Asif Merchant's involvement in 'bid on Trump' - Nation","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2024\/87393\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"White House denies Pakistani citizen Asif Merchant's involvement in 'bid on Trump' - Nation","og_description":"Washington (National Times) The White House has denied involvement of Pakistani citizen Asif Merchant in plot to assassinate former United States president Donald Trump. 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