Fox News has resurfaced David Ignatius’s op-ed for The Washington Post dated to 2012 that suggests Osama bin Laden wanted to assassinate Barack Obama to make Joe Biden president and throw the United States “into a crisis.”
The alleged plot reportedly stems from documents that were seized from bin Laden’s Pakistan compound after he was assassinated in May 2011. According to Fox News , these documents suggest that the al-Qaeda founder wanted to eliminate Obama along with top U.S. military commander David Petraeus while they traveled by plane.
In a message to a top deputy, bin Laden allegedly expressed his desire to see Biden at the helm of the United States.
“Biden is totally unprepared for that post, which will lead the U.S. into a crisis. As for Petraeus, he is the man of the hour… and killing him would alter the war’s path…”
Bin Laden allegedly wanted terrorist Ilyas Kashmiri — who was killed in 2011 not long after his leader’s death — to carry out the assassination. Despite the purported plans, U.S. intelligence officials told The Washington Post that bin Laden’s scheme never progressed past the aspirational stage.
“The plot to target Obama was probably bluster, since al-Qaeda apparently lacked the weapons to shoot down U.S. aircraft,” Ignatius wrote.
“But it’s a chilling reminder that even when he was embattled and in hiding, bin Laden still dreamed of pulling off another spectacular terror attack against the United States.”
Ignatius also noted that Obama administration officials claimed that the plot was never a “serious threat.”
Joe Biden is now trying to cover up his opposition to the Osama bin Laden raid.
Moments ago, Biden says, “No I didn’t” when confronted by Peter Doocy for being against the raid.
8 years ago, Biden said he opposed raid and told Obama, “Mr. President, my suggestion is don’t go.” pic.twitter.com/zAWhMf38MU
— Steve Guest (@SteveGuest) January 3, 2020
In January of 2012, Biden reportedly said he opposed the raid that ultimately killed bin Laden. Later, in 2015, the former vice president purportedly claimed that he had pushed Obama to carry out the attack. When he appeared for an interview on CBS’s 60 Minutes in 2015, Biden claimed that everything he said was “accurate” and insisted he suggested one more verification before carrying out the mission.
During a presidential debate in 2012, Obama claimed that Biden was in opposition to the plan to assassinate bin Laden.
As noted by Raw Story , the resurfaced story of the alleged Obama-Petraeus plan comes just hours after a Fox News poll showed Biden leading President Donald Trump by eight percentage points. The network also highlighted that Trump is only up seven points among male voters, which is significantly less than the 17-point advantage he had in 2016.
A Wednesday Quinnipiac University poll also showed Biden ahead of Trump in Florida, with 46 percent support compared to Trump’s 42 percent. The finding is notable as Florida is expected to be a critical battleground state in November.
