The U.S. Justice Department has secured an indictment against three men for allegedly hacking the Trump campaign on behalf of the Iranian government in order to hurt former President Donald Trump’s election prospects.
Trump’s name isn’t included in the 37-page indictment that was released Friday, but details within the document make clear the charges relate to an attempt to steal information from his campaign and leak it to journalists and the presidential campaign of Joe Biden, before Biden chose to step aside in the election.
For example, the indictment describes conspirators allegedly using their access to the personal accounts of people associated with a presidential campaign around May to steal non-public campaign documents and emails, and then trying to weaponize stolen campaign material by leaking it in late June, including to “what was then another identified U.S. presidential campaign.”
Biden announced his withdrawal from the presidential race in July.
The FBI said earlier this month that Iranian hackers had sent people associated with Biden’s campaign unsolicited information they had stolen from the Trump campaign. The bureau said there was no information to indicate the recipients replied to the overture.
The men, Masoud Jalili, Seyyed Ali Aghamiri, and Yasar Balaghi, face conspiracy charges related to getting information from a protected computer and supporting terrorism, as well as wire fraud and identity theft charges. They are employed by the Iranian government’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps military branch, according to the indictment.
The charged men – whose last known residence was in Tehran, according to the indictment – have not been apprehended by the U.S. government.
In a press conference Friday afternoon, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said pursuing the defendants will be an ongoing priority for U.S. officials.
“From the Justice Department’s point of view, which is the enforcement point of view, we will follow these people for the rest of their lives,” Garland said.
Why is Iran targeting the Trump campaign?
The indictment describes a range of hostile actions Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps military branch has engaged in against the United States. They include trying to kill or kidnap U.S. nationals and allies in order to repress Iranian regime dissidents or to exact revenge for the Trump administration’s killing of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani in Baghdad in January of 2020.
That killing appears to have been at least part of the Iranian government’s motivation. The charged crimes cover not just targeting the Trump campaign, but also hacking activity going back to January of 2020 to compromise email accounts of dozens of prominent current and former public officials as well as of a national security correspondent at a major newspaper.
One unnamed victim, for instance, was a senior State Department official at the time of Soleimani’s death “and therefore of interest to the (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps),” according to the indictment.
The three alleged hackers are charged with a terrorism-related crime because the State Department designated their employer, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a foreign terrorist organization in 2019. Conspiring to provide material support to such organizations is a crime.
The wire fraud charges stem from the men’s alleged use of wire communications to fraudulently get information from eight separate victims between 2022 and 2024. The men also allegedly stole identities as part of the scheme.
Has the Harris campaign faced any threats?
U.S. intelligence officials have said that, while Iran has targeted the Trump presidential campaign, Russia has been targeting the campaign of Vice President Kamala Harris.
The Kremlin, for instance, has created or altered videos to alienate Harris supporters in the presidential race, such as a video falsely claiming Harris left a 13-year-old girl who was paralyzed in a hit-and-run.
Contributing: Josh Meyer
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Alleged Trump campaign Iranian hackers charged with terrorism crime
