Donald Trump assassination plot fears have intensified in Florida after a retired US general claimed that up to 20,000 Iranian 'sleeper agents' are operating inside the United States and are ready to target the former president, following a March security scare near Palm Beach International Airport.
The news came after a bizarre and still only partially explained incident on the nightAir Force Onewas due to depart Florida for Washington with Trump on board. According to accounts from military and intelligence figures cited by US media, a drone and a civilian aircraft were both reported in restricted airspace near Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate, prompting the Air Force to scramble F-16 fighter jets and deploy flares. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) imposed a ground stop, but has not publicly clarified what it believes happened.
Retired Army General Paul Vallely has been the most outspoken figure linking the Palm Beach scare to a broader Donald Trump assassination plot allegedly driven by Iran. In remarks reported in the original coverage, Vallely insisted 'there is no doubt' that hostile actors were probing for a way to hit the former president, claiming Trump has had a 'bull's-eye on his back' since what is described as the start of awar with Iranin February.
Another unnamed foreign affairs expert, said to have close ties to the Trump camp, echoed that claim and argued Tehran is seeking 'payback' for Trump's decision to 'take out the ayatollah' in the early days of that conflict. That characterisation is theirs, not independently verified, and no official US government statement in the material provided confirms a formal state of war.
Both sources allege that Iran has turned to deniable methods rather than conventional military confrontation, focusing on assassination plots and drone operations controlled by operatives embedded across the United States. It is within this narrative that the striking number of 20,000 'sleeper agents' appears, supposedly activated between 2021 and early 2025.
Security experts quoted say those individuals are believed to have entered during the administration of former President Joe Biden, and that as many as 18,000 are now 'unaccounted for.' No underlying immigration or law-enforcement data are provided to substantiate those figures, and readers are left reliant on the assertions of unnamed experts and political critics. Nothing in the available documents confirms the 20,000 number, so it should be treated with considerable caution.
Republican Senator Bill Hagerty of Tennessee, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, did not endorse that specific figure but described the reported numbers as 'deeply concerning,' giving at least some political weight to the alarm being expressed on the American right.
The Palm Beach incident that has triggered this latest round of claims began when an unidentified drone was reported in the no-fly zone around Mar-a-Lago, only a few miles from Palm Beach International. Helicopters were sent to investigate. Shortly afterwards, F‑16s were scrambled to intercept a civilian aircraft that had also strayed into restricted airspace.
The pilot of the plane eventually communicated with authorities and was escorted away. The drone, however, effectively vanished from the public record. Officials have not said who was operating it, what type it was or where it went. When pressed for an explanation of the ground stop, the FAA 'mysteriously declined' to comment, according to the intelligence source cited.
That vacuum has been filled instead by speculation. 'The fact that the fate or identity of the drone has not been made public is a clear sign it represented a real danger,' the unnamed intelligence expert claimed. Again, that is interpretation rather than evidence.
Source: International Business Times UK
