Secret Service is examining apparent Iranian video outlining Trump motorcade routes, assassination opportunities

The U.S. Secret Service is examining a video that appears to have been produced by Iranian operatives and aims to identify opportunities to assassinate President Donald Trump, including supposed motorcade routes used by his protective details in Florida and New York.

The video, which was sent to Nextgov/FCW by a U.S. government official, is titled “Where to Kill Trump?!” with the title written in a blood-stained font alongside a bloody silhouette of the president’s side profile. In high-quality, likely AI-generated red, black and white graphics of people, buildings, vehicles, roads and other infrastructure, it claims to show how the president and his Secret Service detail commute from Palm Beach International Airport in Florida to his Mar-a-Lago estate, and from LaGuardia Airport to Trump Tower in New York City. 

It has been taken off several sites since reports of it surfaced around the end of last week. The Secret Service is “aware of it and we’re looking into it,” a spokesperson for the agency said in a brief phone interview on Friday.

“Protecting the president and those under our protection is a responsibility we take extremely seriously,” a spokesperson added in a follow-up email. “While we do not comment on the specifics of protective intelligence, our teams work around the clock to assess real-time information and intelligence, ensuring our protective operations remain layered, adaptive, and fully aligned to address the climate.”

The video is narrated in Persian with English captions. “This is no ordinary report,” the captions say. “Based on the most complex security protocols between 2024 and 2026, Donald Trump’s routine movements in the US have been gathered and decoded.”

Almost three minutes long, the video describes the apparent core arrangement of the president’s motorcade, alongside the routes that are supposedly taken in each location. The Florida route also claims to show how Trump is escorted from Mar-a-Lago to the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach during the weekends.

Nextgov/FCW is withholding details of the routes, road closures and security measures described in the video, on grounds that, if its contents are accurate enough, it may expose protective details that could put officials in danger. About halfway through the video, the captions say a specific location along one of the purported routes “seems like a very suitable location for the free people of the world!”

At the end of the video, as it describes supposed street closure arrangements around Trump Tower, the captions tell viewers: “Stay tuned … we are going to get even closer than this.”

It’s not immediately clear how widely the video has been circulated or who specifically produced it, nor when it was completed and disseminated, or whether more follow-up videos exist. Some social media posts last week attributed the clip to Iran’s state-backed Fars News Agency, though this could not be immediately verified.

But if the video's contents are sufficiently precise, it could raise concerns that Iran has expanded its surveillance and targeting efforts against the president, potentially revealing details about the routes and protective measures used by his Secret Service detail. 

Tehran has long threatened to assassinate Trump in retaliation for the 2020 U.S. drone strike that killed Qasem Soleimani, the commander of Iran’s elite Quds Force. Those calls from Iranian leaders have intensified since Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed in a joint U.S.-Israeli strike earlier this year that began the ongoing Iran war.

The president makes regular trips to Florida to stay at his Mar-a-Lago estate, where he and his team often land at the Palm Beach airport, now officially named President Donald J. Trump International Airport. A Nextgov/FCW analysis of White House travel pool reports shows that the president appears to have only made two trips to New York City via LaGuardia last year. Throughout 2026, Trump made visits to New York, but they appear to not have involved LaGuardia as a destination airport.

Former presidents receive lifelong Secret Service protection. In 2024, while out of office, Trump regularly traveled by Secret Service motorcade from Trump Tower to the Manhattan Criminal Courthouse for his criminal hush-money trial. Trump also used his private Boeing 757, nicknamed “Trump Force One,” to travel between Florida and New York during the trial, including flights into LaGuardia.

Iran’s permanent mission to the United Nations did not return a request for comment.

“What’s most telling about this video is what it does not include,” said Paul Eckloff, a former Secret Service official who oversaw presidential protection duties for then President Barack Obama and for Trump in his first term. “Is this video a coded signal to attack things that are not listed?” he said, referring to the fact that presidential routes in Washington, D.C. are not described.

“That would be a concern of mine, that there is another target that they’re trying to steer concern away from. Or is D.C. such a hard target that they wouldn’t attempt it? I don’t know,” Eckloff said. He added that fear is a “primary export” of Iranian groups and opined that even a small attack on the president in D.C. would shake confidence more profoundly than an attack in Florida or New York.

The Secret Service is likely conducting a forensic review of the video with assistance from the intelligence community, Eckloff said.

Investigators would look for distinctive words, phrases or technical clues that could help trace the video to its original source, including the AI model or other tools used to make it. Any credible findings could then be shared with the president’s protective detail, which may adjust motorcade routes or strengthen security along them, he added.

The video illustrates how generative AI is increasingly being used in information operations and modern-day warfare. AI tools can give such content a more polished and realistic appearance, but the apparent use of AI doesn’t necessarily prove whether the routes or scenarios depicted are based on actual gathered intelligence.

“The Secret Service has all sorts of intelligence sources … both in this country and outside, so it’s understandable that they would already have this and be evaluating it in terms of the procedures followed,” said A.T. Smith, a former Secret Service deputy director who served in the agency for nearly 30 years between the Reagan and Obama administrations.

“It’s not uncommon for these sorts of things to pop up when you’re having these kinds of events in the world,” he added. “I’m sure the service is getting information from not only American intelligence agencies and sources, but probably around the world as well.”

Earlier this month, Trump departed the NATO summit in Turkey aboard the older Air Force One instead of the Qatari-donated Boeing 747-8 after U.S. officials received Israeli intelligence warning of a possible Iranian plot to target him, The Wall Street Journal reported.

The video has emerged as the war between the United States and Iran continues to widen, with American forces striking Iranian targets and Tehran retaliating against U.S. personnel and regional allies. At least two U.S. service members were killed Friday while defending against an Iranian missile and drone attack in Jordan, the U.S. military said over the weekend.

“Given Trump’s worsening war in Iran, this video is very concerning, and I hope the Secret Service investigates it properly and adjusts protectee operations as necessary to counter this threat,” said Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., the ranking member on the House Homeland Security Committee.

“However, I have become increasingly concerned the Secret Service does not have the proper resources to do its job after its funding has been diverted to construction of Trump’s ballroom and it has frequently been forced to devote vast resources to act as a chauffeur for JD Vance and his family,” he said, referring to recent reports that federal funds were redirected toward security work connected to the White House ballroom and that agents have grown frustrated with the Vance family’s frequent, last-minute travel requests.