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Plot to kill Obama, 2 indicted

by Sanjay Jha | November 5, 2008 at 11:21 pm

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Being the first African American elect President Barack Obama has become prime target of the white racist group. There has been fear that the US white hate movements - may be plotting to kill him, especially in the chaotic months before he enters the Washington security bubble. A white-supremacy group this week carried a video clip warning against an Obama administration on their website.

A federal grand jury in Memphis, Tennessee, has indicted two white supremacists accused of plotting to kill Democrat Barack Obama and dozens of other black people.

Twenty-year-old Daniel Cowart and 18-year-old Paul Schlesselman were arrested last month, before Obama won the presidential election. They are being held without bond.

They were indicted on Wednesday on charges of possessing a sawed-off shotgun, planning to rob a licensed gun dealer and threatening a presidential candidate.

Authorities say they plotted a killing spree that would end with them attacking Obama while dressed in white tuxedoes and top hats.

Court records indicate Cowart and Schlesselman conceived the plot on their own and it fell apart quickly. Messages were left with their attorneys.

US security establishment now faces major challenges in protecting President elect. His skin colour may make him more of a target than his predecessors.

Yet the president-elect's skin colour has only added to concerns in the country, where there are more than 200 million legally owned firearms and about 30,000 gun deaths per year, and where four sitting presidents have been murdered and two more wounded in assassination attempts.

'It's going to be a unique and challenging environment' for Mr Obama's security detail, Mr Fred Burton, who is vice president of counter-terrorism at geo-political intelligence analysis firm Stratfor, told wires agencies.

'The protective security threat and the challenges surrounding the protection for him is extremely difficult. It's going to take a lot of resources and a tremendous amount of protective and tactical analysis to stay ahead of the bad guys,' said Mr Burton, a former Secret Service agent who is publishing a Stratfor report on Thursday on the issue.