A team of Iranian hackers posed as Ginni Thomas, the wife of conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, in an attempt to extract information from people close to former President Donald Trump, CNN reported .
An indictment unsealed Friday alleges that the three Iranian men gained access to the email account of a Trump campaign official this summer, allowing them to steal debate preparation materials and information about possible candidates for the vice presidency. This practice is known as “spear phishing” among hackers. Among those whose accounts were compromised was Roger Stone, the veteran Republican trickster previously pardoned by Trump before leaving office.
The Justice Department also said the men leaked some of the information they stole to the media in an effort to sow discord ahead of the election. The first part of the leak was finally published on Thursday by independent journalist Ken Klippenstein, leading to his ban from X.
Masoud Jalili, Seyyed Ali Aghamiri and Yasar Balaghi face charges of identity theft and wire fraud. The indictment says they were acting on behalf of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Although Ginni Thomas is not mentioned by name in the indictment, it says the hackers created a fake email using the identity of a “spouse of a state Supreme Court justice -United”.
CNN reported that it was Thomas.
The account was created in April 2020, but was not used in hacking efforts until this year. Between April and May 2024, the email was used as part of a phishing campaign targeting, among others, a former security advisor to a former president.
Ginni Thomas, pictured with her husband Clarence at a Trump state dinner at the White House, is an arch conservative who has previously made headlines with her support of Donald Trump’s false claims of election victory.
Erin Scott/Reuters
In addition to being the wife of a Supreme Court justice, Thomas is a conservative activist. She made headlines for sending text messages to Mark Meadows, then-chief of staff to Donald Trump, on January 6, 2021, urging him to overturn the election, as Trump supporters stormed the Capitol .
One read: “Biden and the left are attempting the biggest heist in our history.”
Thomas, a conservative firebrand, claims she doesn’t influence her husband, a conservative firebrand.
Thomas was one of several identities fraudulently used by hackers to target the Trump campaign. The others have not been named, but among the victims detailed by the Justice Department, some appear closely linked to Trump, suggesting that the use of names such as Ginni Thomas was an achievement by the Iranians . Among those who fell for the phishing trap were a former deputy director of the CIA, a former ambassador to Israel, a former State Department adviser who appears to have advised Nikki Haley’s failed presidential campaign, and a former presidential adviser on internal security.
Attorney General Merrick Garland addressed the indictment Friday.
“The defendants’ own comments clearly show that they were attempting to undermine former President Trump’s campaign ahead of the 2024 U.S. presidential election,” he told reporters.
“These authoritarian regimes, which violate the human rights of their own citizens, have no say in our country’s democratic process,” Garland said.
According to the FBI, the hackers attempted to send material to a member of the Biden-Harris campaign, who did not respond.
