Latest / The President's Daily Brief / October 2nd, 2026: Iran’s Economy Is Getting Worse & Kasparov Warned of Assassination Plot

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October 2nd, 2026: Iran’s Economy Is Getting Worse & Kasparov Warned of Assassination Plot · The President's Daily Brief

• 0:11
  It's Friday,
• 0:12
  the 2nd of October.
• 0:13
  Welcome to the President's Daily Brief.
• 0:15
  I'm Mike Baker,
• 0:16
  your eyes and ears on the world stage and still on the road
• 0:20
  and still apparently
• 0:21
  in some posh hotel room in the UK.
• 0:25
  All right,
• 0:25
  let's get briefed.
• 0:26
  And first up,
• 0:26
  the latest signs of trouble for Iran's economy
• 0:29
  as stranded tankers,
• 0:31
  a record low currency,
• 0:32
  and tighter US pressure
• 0:34
  point to a deepening economic crisis.
• 0:36
  Later in the show,
• 0:37
  China-linked hackers are using fake identities.
• 0:41
  Including that of a former US official
• 0:43
  to target experts working on artificial intelligence.
• 0:46
  Well,
• 0:46
  I am shocked.
• 0:47
  Plus,
• 0:48
  we'll have the latest on the RAF Fairford investigation,
• 0:51
  where Britain now says
• 0:53
  it believes Iran played a role in the suspected plot near the airbase.
• 0:57
  And in today's back of the brief,
• 0:59
  the former world chess champion and longtime Putin critic,
• 1:02
  Garry Kasparov
• 1:04
  says security services warned him he may be the target of an assassination plot.
• 1:09
  But first,
• 1:10
  today's PDB spotlight.
• 1:12
  For months,
• 1:12
  the Iranian regime used the Strait of Hormuz
• 1:15
  to trap commercial shipping inside the Gulf and force the rest of the region
• 1:19
  to feel the cost of the war.
• 1:22
  Now
• 1:22
  roughly 20 Iranian or Iran-linked tankers are sitting
• 1:26
  stranded off the coast of Sri Lanka,
• 1:28
  their engines idled,
• 1:30
  unable to return home,
• 1:31
  and reportedly running short on food,
• 1:33
  fuel,
• 1:34
  and fresh water.
• 1:35
  The Wall Street Journal reports that those
• 1:37
  vessels are among dozens of tankers caught
• 1:40
  in Asian waters since the US reinstated its blockade of Iran in July.
• 1:45
  Now many had been involved in the shadow trade
• 1:47
  that moved sanctioned Iranian oil to China,
• 1:50
  and now Washington is going after the infrastructure
• 1:53
  that keeps that trade functioning,
• 1:55
  pressuring governments and private companies
• 1:57
  not to refuel,
• 1:58
  provision,
• 1:59
  or service Iranian vessels.
• 2:02
  If those companies start worrying that helping an Iranian vessel
• 2:05
  could expose them to US sanctions,
• 2:07
  well,
• 2:07
  Iran's shadow fleet becomes much harder to operate.
• 2:11
  So the pressure campaign is no longer just
• 2:12
  about blocking Iranian barrels from reaching market.
• 2:16
  It's increasingly about making the entire system that moves those barrels of oil
• 2:20
  more difficult and more expensive to sustain.
• 2:23
  And there's another part of this that
• 2:25
  makes the situation particularly uncomfortable for Tehran
• 2:29
  while Iranian ships are getting stuck.
• 2:31
  Other Gulf producers are increasingly finding ways to get their oil moving again.
• 2:36
  Regional crude exports rebounded sharply in September,
• 2:39
  reaching their highest level since the war began in February.
• 2:43
  Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have increased shipments.
• 2:46
  More tankers are moving through the Strait of Hormuz,
• 2:49
  and alternative routes and transfer points
• 2:51
  are helping Gulf producers work around some of the disruption.
• 2:55
  Iran spent months trying to make Hormuz a problem for everyone else.
• 3:00
  Increasingly,
• 3:01
  its neighbors are adapting while Iran remains constrained,
• 3:05
  and that pressure
• 3:06
  is showing up inside the country.
• 3:09
  Iran's currency hit another record low this week,
• 3:11
  with more than 2.5 million riyals now trading for a single US dollar.
• 3:16
  The previous record
• 3:17
  had been set less than a month earlier,
• 3:19
  and the currency has repeatedly fallen to new lows since the war began.
• 3:24
  That decline has consequences,
• 3:25
  of course,
• 3:26
  beyond a number on a currency board.
• 3:28
  A weaker rial makes imported goods more expensive,
• 3:31
  erodes purchasing power,
• 3:32
  and adds pressure to an economy
• 3:34
  already struggling with sanctions,
• 3:36
  reduced oil revenue,
• 3:37
  and the costs of war.
• 3:39
  We're also beginning to see some of that strain in Iran's health system.
• 3:43
  The Associated Press reports that medicine prices have risen sharply,
• 3:47
  and shortages are becoming more common in part
• 3:50
  because Iranian pharmaceutical companies
• 3:53
  still depend on imported ingredients that have
• 3:55
  become more difficult and expensive to obtain.
• 3:58
  Some pharmacies report that certain medications
• 4:01
  now cost several times what they did before,
• 4:04
  and Washington is apparently
• 4:06
  reportedly not backing off the pressure.
• 4:08
  The Treasury Department this week imposed another
• 4:10
  round of sanctions targeting individuals and companies
• 4:14
  accused of helping Iran obtain weapons and military components.
• 4:18
  So
• 4:19
  to sum up,
• 4:20
  the current picture remains dire for the Iranian regime.
• 4:23
  Its oil is harder to move.
• 4:25
  Some of the ships that carry it are stranded.
• 4:27
  Its neighbors are recovering more of their own exports.
• 4:30
  The rial is setting new lows.
• 4:32
  Prices and shortages are hitting ordinary Iranians,
• 4:36
  and Washington.
• 4:37
  But Washington is continuing to look for additional ways to tighten that pressure.
• 4:42
  All right.
• 4:43
  Coming up next,
• 4:44
  China-linked hackers target US AI experts,
• 4:48
  and Britain says Iran may have played a role in the suspected RAF Fairford plot.
• 4:53
  I'll be right back.
• 4:56
  Hey,
• 4:56
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• 5:58
  Chinese hackers are reportedly targeting some
• 6:01
  of America's leading artificial intelligence experts
• 6:04
  in an effort to gain access to their emails,
• 6:06
  and according to cybersecurity researchers,
• 6:09
  the real target
• 6:10
  may be Washington's plans for the global AI race.
• 6:13
  Reuters reports that a hacking group linked to China
• 6:16
  has been impersonating prominent American AI and national security experts,
• 6:21
  including a former White House official.
• 6:23
  In an effort to steal passwords from researchers and policy specialists,
• 6:27
  the campaign was uncovered by the cybersecurity firm Proof Point,
• 6:31
  which tracks the group under the name TA 419.
• 6:34
  That's catchy.
• 6:35
  According to the company,
• 6:36
  the hackers have been targeting people at American and Japanese think tanks,
• 6:40
  defense contractors,
• 6:41
  universities,
• 6:42
  and law firms
• 6:43
  since at least 2025.
• 6:46
  More recently,
• 6:46
  they've actually begun impersonating experts in
• 6:48
  artificial intelligence and national security.
• 6:51
  Among the most high profile is Lynn Parker,
• 6:54
  who recently served
• 6:55
  as principal deputy director of the White
• 6:58
  House Office of Science and Technology Policy
• 7:01
  and played a leading role
• 7:02
  in shaping the Trump administration's AI policy.
• 7:06
  Proofpoint says the hackers sent emails appearing
• 7:08
  to come from Parker and other experts
• 7:11
  typically proposing some kind of AI collaboration or policy initiative.
• 7:15
  Targets would then be directed to websites designed to steal their passwords.
• 7:20
  Reuters independently identified another Chinese target as Alex Engler,
• 7:24
  another former White House official
• 7:25
  who now leads the Penn Center on Media,
• 7:28
  Technology,
• 7:28
  and Democracy.
• 7:29
  Engler says he received an email supposedly from Parker
• 7:32
  inviting him to participate in a new AI policy project,
• 7:36
  but something about the message,
• 7:38
  as he put it,
• 7:39
  felt slightly nebulously off.
• 7:43
  After checking with other people in the field,
• 7:45
  Engler realized Parker had not sent the email.
• 7:48
  Now the campaign appears to have been relatively small.
• 7:50
  Proof point says fewer than 10 people at
• 7:52
  a handful of organizations were apparently targeted.
• 7:56
  But who those people were and what they worked on
• 7:59
  may tell us considerably more about what the hackers were after.
• 8:02
  According to proof point,
• 8:03
  the targets included experts working on AI regulation,
• 8:06
  export controls,
• 8:07
  and America's national AI strategy,
• 8:10
  leading researchers to conclude that the operation may reflect
• 8:14
  an intelligence interest in US policymaking
• 8:17
  rather than technology theft alone.
• 8:20
  Proofpoint attributed the campaign to China based on the
• 8:22
  malware and internet infrastructure used in the attacks,
• 8:26
  along with targeting patterns that the company says
• 8:29
  align with Chinese intelligence priorities.
• 8:31
  Now Beijing has long denied accusations that it conducts cyber espionage,
• 8:36
  and Beijing
• 8:37
  has long snickered
• 8:38
  quietly after making those denials.
• 8:41
  The Chinese embassy in Washington did not respond to Reuters' request for comment
• 8:44
  on this latest report,
• 8:46
  but if a proof points assessment is correct.
• 8:49
  The operation offers an interesting window into
• 8:51
  the broader competition between Washington and Beijing
• 8:55
  over artificial intelligence.
• 8:57
  Beyond their interest in what American AI systems can do,
• 9:00
  there is enormous value for Chinese intelligence in understanding
• 9:04
  how Washington plans to regulate the technology,
• 9:06
  what capabilities it intends to restrict from reaching China,
• 9:10
  and where American policymakers believe the competition is heading.
• 9:14
  And there is clearly an advantage to China
• 9:17
  if they can also manipulate opinion in the US
• 9:20
  to call for more guardrails on AI development.
• 9:23
  The timing here is also interesting.
• 9:25
  Just last week,
• 9:26
  President Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping
• 9:29
  agreed to establish a new dialogue that's good
• 9:31
  between the two countries on artificial intelligence,
• 9:34
  along with a bilateral communication channel
• 9:37
  for AI-related incidents
• 9:38
  as part of a broader effort to stabilize relations between Washington and Beijing.
• 9:43
  And now we learned that
• 9:44
  at the same time as Xi was in Washington making nice,
• 9:47
  A China aligned hacking group has been busy targeting
• 9:51
  the US experts involved in shaping American AI policy.
• 9:56
  All right,
• 9:57
  I want to turn now to Britain,
• 9:58
  where the Prime Minister says there are strong indications that Iran
• 10:02
  played a part in Sunday's suspected plot outside RAF Fairford.
• 10:06
  That's the airbase used by
• 10:07
  American bombers to strike the Iranian regime.
• 10:10
  British Prime Minister Andy Burnham made that assessment public
• 10:13
  on Wednesday in an interview with the BBC,
• 10:16
  putting Iran at the center of an
• 10:18
  investigation that's already triggered a major security response
• 10:21
  and alarm among Western allies.
• 10:24
  Immediately after the arrests,
• 10:25
  you may recall,
• 10:26
  Burnham urged people not to speculate about the
• 10:28
  suspect's motives or connections to other countries.
• 10:32
  Counterterrorism police subsequently confirmed that they were examining
• 10:35
  whether a foreign state was involved,
• 10:37
  including
• 10:38
  whether proxies were knowingly or unknowingly working
• 10:41
  on behalf of a foreign state.
• 10:44
  Now Burnham is going further,
• 10:46
  publicly naming the Iranian regime,
• 10:48
  quote,
• 10:48
  saying there are strong indications that Iran played a part
• 10:52
  in what happened over the weekend at RAF Fairford,
• 10:55
  while stressing that this remains a ongoing,
• 10:57
  complex,
• 10:58
  and serious police investigation.
• 11:00
  Well,
• 11:00
  I'm glad it's serious.
• 11:01
  So what has led him from warning
• 11:03
  against speculation to making that accusation himself?
• 11:06
  Well,
• 11:06
  Burnham declined to disclose the evidence supporting his assessment,
• 11:10
  saying Moore would be released in due course.
• 11:12
  We don't know yet whether new findings prompted that shift
• 11:16
  or whether officials are now prepared to say more
• 11:18
  about information they already held,
• 11:21
  but either way,
• 11:22
  publicly pointing to Tehran raises the
• 11:24
  stakes in an already serious investigation.
• 11:27
  As I discussed earlier this week on the PDB,
• 11:29
  RF Fairford is in western England,
• 11:32
  sitting about 90 miles outside of London,
• 11:35
  and American bombers have been using it in recent months as
• 11:37
  a launch pad to conduct missions in the war against Iran.
• 11:41
  If the connection
• 11:43
  to Iran is established,
• 11:44
  the questions extend well beyond
• 11:46
  those five men.
• 11:47
  To what the Iranian regime
• 11:49
  wanted to accomplish,
• 11:51
  Burnham says British and American officials have been
• 11:53
  in close contact as the investigation develops.
• 11:56
  Washington had already been signaling concern about an outside connection.
• 12:00
  Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Monday
• 12:02
  that the incident was connected to a foreign country,
• 12:05
  although he stopped short of naming one.
• 12:07
  He did,
• 12:08
  however,
• 12:08
  specifically point to Iran's threats against American interests worldwide.
• 12:13
  Saying,
• 12:13
  quote,
• 12:14
  We're going to always take that very seriously,
• 12:16
  end quote.
• 12:17
  Meanwhile,
• 12:17
  investigators have released more details
• 12:20
  about what they found outside Fairford.
• 12:22
  5 British men,
• 12:23
  all in their 20s and living in London,
• 12:25
  were arrested near the base early Sunday morning on suspicion of terrorism
• 12:29
  and explosives offenses.
• 12:31
  More than 85 nearby homes were evacuated while police and military
• 12:35
  personnel spent more than 2 days examining the 3 white vans,
• 12:40
  including with a bomb disposal robot.
• 12:42
  But on Tuesday authorities announced a finding that complicated the picture.
• 12:46
  There was an unspecified quantity of gasoline inside the vans,
• 12:51
  but no explosives or improvised explosive devices.
• 12:54
  By then,
• 12:54
  all 5 suspects had been released on bail Monday.
• 12:58
  That was a decision police defended
• 13:00
  following criticism from some,
• 13:02
  including President Trump.
• 13:04
  Shortly after the arrests,
• 13:05
  Trump had said the suspects planned quote
• 13:08
  big damage.
• 13:09
  British authorities have not publicly explained
• 13:11
  what evidence would support that description.
• 13:14
  Still,
• 13:14
  the absence of a bomb does not explain what the men were doing there.
• 13:18
  But you ask yourself,
• 13:19
  did one of the suspects help bring police to the scene?
• 13:22
  Well,
• 13:22
  that is now under investigation.
• 13:24
  Police say a local resident called at around 1:36 in the morning Sunday
• 13:29
  after seeing masked men
• 13:30
  around three parked white vans.
• 13:32
  Yeah,
• 13:32
  that does sound suspicious,
• 13:34
  but that was not the first warning that authorities received.
• 13:37
  Almost an hour earlier,
• 13:38
  someone reported three suspicious vehicles heading toward the base.
• 13:42
  Now,
• 13:43
  according to the Times of London,
• 13:44
  the BBC and other British outlets.
• 13:47
  Investigators believe that earlier call may have come
• 13:50
  from one of the 5 men subsequently arrested.
• 13:53
  Police declined to confirm whether a suspect made it.
• 13:56
  The Times reports that this may have been a surveillance,
• 13:58
  maybe a dry run to test security,
• 14:00
  or a stunt intended to send a message to the British government.
• 14:04
  Investigators are also reportedly examining whether the caller got cold feet
• 14:08
  or whether contacting police was in fact part of the plan.
• 14:12
  Iran meanwhile,
• 14:13
  as you might suspect,
• 14:14
  is pointing to the suspect's release on bail
• 14:16
  as grounds to dismiss the accusation.
• 14:19
  Its embassy in Britain rejected the allegations on Monday.
• 14:23
  Then on Wednesday,
• 14:24
  Foreign Minister Abbas Aranci responded directly to Burnham,
• 14:27
  saying,
• 14:28
  quote,
• 14:28
  I can confirm Iran's belief
• 14:30
  that releasing supposed terrorists working for foreign states really says it all.
• 14:35
  You're barking up the wrong tree,
• 14:37
  end quote.
• 14:38
  And in today's back of the brief,
• 14:40
  a former chess champion,
• 14:41
  Garry Kasparov,
• 14:42
  says he was warned that his life may be at risk as authorities investigate
• 14:47
  suspected plots against Russian dissidents abroad.
• 14:50
  More on that
• 14:51
  when we come back.
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• 14:54
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  In today's back of the brief,
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  I want to talk about Garry Kasparov,
• 17:02
  who
• 17:03
  has spent years speaking out against Vladimir Putin's regime
• 17:06
  from outside Russia.
• 17:08
  Now the longtime Kremlin critic
• 17:10
  says American and Lithuanian security services
• 17:13
  warned him that in exile,
• 17:15
  his life is in danger.
• 17:17
  That warning comes amid allegations that Russian intelligence was
• 17:20
  involved in assassination plots against Kremlin opponents living abroad.
• 17:25
  Now Kasparov
• 17:26
  is best known as a former world chess champion,
• 17:29
  but he has also become one of the Kremlin's most persistent critics.
• 17:33
  After retiring from chess in 2005,
• 17:36
  Kasparov entered politics to fight what he
• 17:38
  saw as Putin's authoritarian consolidation of power,
• 17:42
  a campaign that has since included outspoken
• 17:44
  opposition to the Kremlin's repression at home
• 17:46
  and aggression against Ukraine.
• 17:49
  In a sub stack post Wednesday following a Reuters report,
• 17:52
  he said that he and Ivan Tutrin,
• 17:54
  a Lithuanian-based Russian opposition activist,
• 17:57
  had been advised to take precautions.
• 18:00
  Kasparov wrote,
• 18:01
  quote,
• 18:01
  We were,
• 18:02
  however,
• 18:02
  warned by security services in Lithuania and the US
• 18:05
  that our lives were in danger and that we should take precautions,
• 18:09
  end quote.
• 18:10
  Last month,
• 18:10
  US authorities announced charges against 5 people
• 18:13
  over alleged Russian intelligence-linked plots
• 18:16
  to assassinate two opposition figures,
• 18:18
  one in the US
• 18:19
  and another in Lithuania.
• 18:21
  According to authorities,
• 18:22
  recruits were paid to conduct surveillance on both intended targets.
• 18:26
  Several media reports,
• 18:27
  which have not been independently confirmed,
• 18:30
  named three possible targets Kasparov,
• 18:32
  who lives in New York,
• 18:33
  Ilya Panamayov,
• 18:35
  another Russian dissident based in Ukraine.
• 18:37
  Who travels regularly to the US
• 18:39
  and Tutrin,
• 18:40
  but there's an important distinction.
• 18:42
  Kasparov says neither he nor Tutrin were told that
• 18:45
  they were the specific targets of the alleged plots.
• 18:48
  The warning they received,
• 18:49
  he says,
• 18:49
  was broader but still chilling.
• 18:51
  Their lives were in danger,
• 18:53
  and they should take precautions.
• 18:55
  For years Putin's regime has faced accusations
• 18:58
  of pursuing,
• 18:59
  poisoning,
• 19:00
  threatening,
• 19:00
  and killing opponents
• 19:01
  beyond Russia's borders.
• 19:03
  Moscow naturally denies any connection to assassination plots.
• 19:07
  We had nothing to do with Litvinenko or Skripal or any variety of others.
• 19:12
  Last month,
• 19:12
  the Kremlin said it saw no reason to comment
• 19:14
  on the US allegations without what it called credible evidence
• 19:18
  and facts,
• 19:19
  but that denial
• 19:20
  does not answer the allegations now brought by American authorities,
• 19:23
  and it does not explain away the warning
• 19:26
  that Kasparov says he and Teotrin received from
• 19:29
  US and Lithuanian security services.
• 19:32
  After being warned that his safety may be at risk,
• 19:34
  Kasparov says he will not
• 19:36
  be intimidated into silence,
• 19:37
  writing,
• 19:38
  quote,
• 19:38
  I will continue to do everything I can to rally the free world
• 19:42
  against Putin's murderous dictatorship,
• 19:44
  end quote.
• 19:46
  And that,
• 19:46
  my friends,
• 19:47
  is the president's Daily Brief for Friday,
• 19:49
  the 2nd of October.
• 19:50
  If you have any questions or comments,
• 19:51
  please reach out to me at PDB@thfirsttv.com.
• 19:56
  Finally,
• 19:56
  you'll want to tune into this weekend's edition of our highly,
• 19:59
  possibly critically acclaimed show,
• 20:01
  The PDB Situation Report.
• 20:03
  We're joined by the amazing astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson.
• 20:07
  Neil does,
• 20:08
  frankly,
• 20:08
  a really commendable job keeping up with my highbrow academic theories and
• 20:13
  smart guy ways.
• 20:14
  We're talking all about artificial intelligence,
• 20:16
  and we'll get a look at his new book
• 20:18
  Take Me to Your Leader.
• 20:20
  Bill Roggio from the Foundation for Defense of Democracies also returns this time.
• 20:23
  We're focused on the US military withdrawal
• 20:25
  from Iraq.
• 20:26
  You can catch it tonight at 10:00.m.
• 20:28
  as always on the first TV
• 20:30
  and of course on our YouTube channel.
• 20:31
  Some are calling it the gold standard of YouTube channels.
• 20:35
  I don't know who those some people are,
• 20:36
  but I'm sure they're out there.
• 20:38
  Just search up at President's Daily Brief on YouTube,
• 20:40
  of course,
• 20:41
  and it's also available wherever you get your podcast stuff.
• 20:44
  I'm Mike Baker,
• 20:45
  and I'll be back later today with the PDB
• 20:48
  afternoon bulletin.
• 20:48
  Until then,
• 20:50
  stay informed,
• 20:51
  stay safe,
• 20:52
  stay cool.