Tasnim, a Persian-language news agency affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, published a video Monday urging supporters to assassinate First Lady Melania Trump and threatening the president’s 20-year-old son, Barron.
The video, titled “How to Kill Melania Trump,” opens with an image of the first lady’s profile rendered in blood beneath the words “Where to Kill Melania?!” It identifies specific Manhattan department stores where Melania is known to shop, including Bergdorf Goodman and Saks Fifth Avenue, with target markers overlaid on the storefronts, and calls her interest in fashion her “biggest weakness.” The narrator points to details the producers describe as signs of an approaching visit, such as the removal of public trash cans and the welding shut of manhole covers along a motorcade route, and calls on “global freedom fighters” to act on the shopping trips as opportunities for attack.
The video, much of it apparently AI-generated, proposes two methods of attack: contaminating clothing at the identified stores with the nerve agent VX, and offering money to three of Melania’s personal stylists, named individually, to poison her clothing directly. It also points to a hospital near one of the stores, suggesting that a contact on staff there could yield information on the first lady’s movements. English subtitles claim the material was gathered from “anonymous security networks and satellite images,” though the details shown appear to be drawn from public sources, including Secret Service call signs and images of the presidential motorcade. The video closes with a direct threat to Barron Trump, a student at a Washington-area university: “This is just the beginning; Barron Trump, wait for us!”
Tasnim’s media license is held by an agency founded by an IRGC commander, and the outlet is widely regarded as a mouthpiece for the Guards. The United States sanctioned Tasnim in 2023 over its ties to the force, which answers to Iran’s supreme leader.
The video follows a wave of threats against the Trump family since the outbreak of the war between Iran, the United States, and Israel. Billboards appeared in Tehran last week showing Melania, Barron, and the president’s other children — Don Jr., Ivanka, Eric, and Tiffany — with their eyes digitally shut and the word “KILLED” superimposed over their faces, alongside the slogan “blood for blood.” A separate billboard read, “Hey, terrorist! Get ready to die.”
President Trump has said repeatedly that Iran considers him its top target. “I’m on every single one of their lists,” he said several weeks ago. “And so far, I guess I’ve been a little bit lucky, but that maybe doesn’t last very long.” Earlier this month, Trump switched from the newer Air Force One to an older model while departing Turkey after attending a NATO summit, due to specific threats reported by the New York Times. He told the New York Post he has “left instructions” for the U.S. response should Iran succeed in an assassination attempt: to “bomb them at levels that they’ve never seen before.”
In 2024, the Justice Department disclosed an alleged IRGC plot to assassinate Trump ahead of that year’s election. Israel has since shared intelligence with Washington indicating a continuing Iranian plan against the president, according to reports earlier this month.
Melania Trump has kept a lower public profile in recent weeks and did not attend the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner last weekend; a source close to her cited a scheduling conflict. Both she and Barron receive full-time Secret Service protection, and all Trump family residences, including the White House, Trump Tower, the Bedminster golf club, and Mar-a-Lago, remain under heavy security.
The Tasnim video was released shortly after a series of posts by Trump that included AI-generated images mocking Iran, and amid reports that mediated talks between Washington and Tehran may soon produce a breakthrough toward a restored ceasefire. In a separate release, Iran’s Mehr News Agency published its own AI-generated video mocking the U.S. military, showing a Lego-style American soldier crawling from a downed helicopter while an Iranian soldier looks on drinking tea. “Too hot for you, softie,” the caption read. “Go back to your air conditioner.”
The White House and the first lady’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
