US Treasury chief Scott Bessent moved onto military base over Iranian threats

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has recently left his home and relocated to a military base following threats from Iran against his life, according to a New York Times report cited by Israeli outlets. The Times of Israel reported that the American newspaper based its account on people familiar with the matter, and that the Times itself said it was not immediately clear how serious the threats against Bessent were.

The Jerusalem Post also carried the report, and the Israeli news site Ynet flagged it in a Hebrew-language alert stating that, according to a US report, Bessent had moved to live on a military base because of Iranian threats. None of the three Israeli outlets has independent confirmation; all attribute the information to the New York Times. The Times of Israel said the US Treasury Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Who Scott Bessent is

Bessent serves as Treasury Secretary in the administration of President Donald Trump. The Treasury Department is the arm of the US government that handles federal finances and economic policy, and it is also the agency that designs and announces financial sanctions on foreign governments, companies and individuals. That role has put Bessent at the centre of Washington's economic pressure on Tehran.

A photograph published by the Jerusalem Post alongside its report shows Bessent at a press conference at the Treasury Department in Washington on August 24, 2026, where, according to the caption, he outlined further sanctions against Iran. The Times of Israel described Bessent as having been the public face of Washington's policy, though its report was cut off before explaining the point in full. It also ran a photograph of him at a Trump rally in Rock Hill, South Carolina, on October 29, 2026.

A wider US warning about Iranian plots

The report on Bessent comes against the background of a broader American warning. According to the Times of Israel, a senior intelligence official in the Trump administration wrote in a memo, seen by the Reuters news agency late last month, that Iran had stepped up efforts to target US personnel. The memo said Iranian plots to kill American citizens had reached "advanced stages," the Times of Israel reported.

At the same time, the New York Times noted that US officials consider Iran's capacity to mount large-scale attacks inside the United States, and in other territories abroad, to be limited, according to the Times of Israel's summary of the report. Moving a cabinet member onto a military installation suggests the threat was taken seriously enough to change his living arrangements, but the reports do not describe what specific information prompted the decision.

Iran's position

Iran has in the past denied that it plots attacks against officials or against people on American soil, the Times of Israel noted. No Iranian response to this specific report has been published in the material available.

Why Israeli media are following the story

Israeli outlets track threats from Iran closely, given the long confrontation between the two countries and Israel's close security relationship with the United States. A report that a senior American official responsible for sanctions on Iran has needed to relocate for his safety touches on both of those concerns. The Jerusalem Post filed the item in its Iran news section, and Ynet sent it out as a breaking alert.

What the reports do not say

• Which military base Bessent moved to, and exactly when he relocated, beyond the word "recently".
• What form the Iranian threats took, how they were detected, and how serious US officials judge them to be; the New York Times itself said this was not immediately clear.
• Whether the US Treasury Department or the White House will comment; the Treasury had not responded when the Times of Israel published.
• Whether Iran has responded to this particular report.
• Whether other US officials have been moved or given additional protection for similar reasons.