Barack Obama assassination plot in Tennessee

The Barack Obama assassination plot in Tennessee was an alleged plot by Paul Schlesselman and Daniel Cowart to assassinate Barack Obama, who was then the 2008 Democratic Party presidential nominee. The two men, both of whom held strong white supremacist beliefs, spoke of killing Obama during a planned murder spree of 88 African Americans in Tennessee, many of whom were young students at an unidentified, predominantly black school.

Schlesselman and Cowart were arrested on October 22, 2008, and found to be in possession of several weapons. The men told authorities of their planned assassination and killing spree, and said they intended to rob a gun store to obtain additional weapons and commit home robberies to help fund the operation. Although the United States Secret Service said they were taking the plot seriously, authorities were unsure how capable Schlesselman and Cowart were of carrying out the alleged plot. Both plotters pleaded guilty to various federal charges; Judge J. Daniel Breen of the United States District Court for the Western District of Tennessee sentenced Schlesselman to 10 years imprisonment on April 15, 2010, and Cowart to 14 years in prison on October 22, 2010.

Paul Schlesselman, 18, of Helena-West Helena, Arkansas, and Daniel Cowart, 20, of Bells, Tennessee, allegedly plotted to assassinate Barack Obama during his 2008 presidential campaign. Both neo-Nazis, Schlesselman and Cowart were introduced to each other via the Internet in September 2008 by a mutual friend who shared their white supremacist beliefs. Within a month they began planning to kill Obama by driving their vehicle toward him as fast as they could and shooting at him from the windows. The murder was planned as the final act of violence of a killing spree in which the men planned to kill 88 African Americans by gunfire, mostly children at an unidentified, predominantly black school. They also planned to behead 14 of the 88 victims. The numbers were chosen for their special significance in the white power movement;88 means "Heil Hitler", since H is the eighth letter in the alphabet, and 14 represents the 14-word white supremacist mantra, "We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children."

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