So much for diplomatic engagement, eh? While the Biden administration negotiated a return to the 2015 Iran deal with Tehran, its IRGC plotted the assassination of former national security adviser John Bolton. The plot began in October of last year, according to the Department of Justice and CBS News:

A member of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) was charged with plotting the murder of former national security adviser John Bolton, the Justice Department announced Wednesday.

An indictment against Shahram Poursafi, of Tehran, alleges that beginning in October 2021, he attempted to arrange Bolton’s murder, likely in retaliation for the killing of Qassem Soleimani, the head of the IRGC’s elite Quds Force who was killed by a U.S. airstrike in Iraq in January 2020.

Working on behalf of the Quds Force, Poursafi attempted to pay $300,000 to people in the U.S. for the murder, the Justice Department said. The department said there is no evidence that Poursafi has ever been to the U.S.

The indictment alleges that Poursafi and others in the IRGC plot attempted to find assassins for that $300K contract on Bolton’s head. Poursafi was willing to pay up to $15,000 for surveillance of Bolton, although apparently he preferred to transfer the money in Iran rather than the US, for obvious reasons.This person went to the FBI with the information at some point, becoming a “confidential human source” in the investigation.

After that, Poursafi tried to get the informant to find a hitman to do the contracted hit:

Needless to say, the amount of money involved makes it clear that Poursafi wasn’t just playing around with petty cash. This kind of money and the machinations employed to conduct this operation clearly indicates that the IRGC ran it.

Most of the action on Bolton took place between October 2021 and February 2022. What was taking place in negotiations with Iran after that point? Here’s a brief summary:

• February 1, 2022: NYT reports that Biden’s about to “reboot” the JCPOA
• March 1: Biden reportedly moving toward deal proposed by Putin regime
• March 7: Putin envoy brags about getting Iranians a great deal
• March 15: Sergei Lavrov announced “written guarantees” from Biden admin on sanctions waivers in conjunction with renewed JCPOA
• March 17: First reports that Biden planned to remove IRGC from State Department terror list
• March 18: Israel publicly rejects apparent Biden concession on IRGC IRGC
• April 8: Free Beacon reports on massive revenues expected by Russia in renewed JCPOA
• April 19: Joe Manchin publicly objects to any concessions on IRGC

Was the Biden administration unaware of this FBI investigation into an IRGC assassination plot against a former US official while negotiating a normalized status for it? Or did they just not care and were willing to overlook an assassination plot against Bolton to get Iranian oil on the market and stuff Russian pockets with cash?

Perhaps a future Congress will demand testimony on those questions. It’s a cinch that this present Congress won’t ask those questions of Biden and his team. This is clear evidence of a gangster government in Tehran and of the terroristic nature of the IRGC. In a rational administration, we’d be teeing up a deterrence response, not offering concessions and discussing the lifting of sanctions. Even Bill Clinton knew enough to shoot a missile up Saddam Hussein’s behind after the Iraqi plot against former president George H. W. Bush.