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(COLUMBUS, Ohio) — An Ohio man was charged with aiding and abetting a plot to kill former President George W. Bush, the Justice Department said Tuesday.

Shihab Ahmed Shihab Shihab, 52, an Iraqi citizen who lived in Columbus, was arrested early Tuesday by the FBI.

Shihab allegedly exchanged money with an undercover informant working for the FBI in an attempt to bring foreign individuals into the U.S. in order to carry out the assassination. He even traveled to Dallas in February 2022 to carry out surveillance of places regularly visited by the former president, the DOJ said.

He appeared in federal court in Ohio earlier on Tuesday, according to the Justice Department.

Shihab, according to a criminal complaint unsealed on Tuesday, said that he wanted to use an FBI confidential source’s service to “illegally” bring ISIS individuals to the US with the intention to murder Bush.

“Shihab told [Confidential Source 1] that the four Iraqi nationals Shihab wanted to smuggle into the United States are planning to kill former president George W. Bush,” the complaint said. “Shihab advised CS1 that former president Bush had a house and farm in Texas. Shihab twice inquired if CS1 knew what type and amount of security there was protecting former president Bush, as Shihab believed CS1 had connections in the Dallas area. Shihab asked if CS1 thought that four to six individuals were enough to kill former president Bush. CS1 stated that he/she did not know but believed former president Bush would have security.”

He repeatedly made claims to a separate confidential source that he’d be able to get a fake passport and be able to smuggle that source’s brother through the U.S.-Mexico border. He said an upfront payment between $10,000 and $40,000 was to be made in order to smuggle people in.

The U.S. Secret Service said it was prepared to handle any threat to the president.

“The U.S. Secret Service takes all threats to our protectees seriously,” it said in a statement to ABC News. “In order to maintain operational security, the Secret Service does not discuss the means and methods used to conduct our protective operations or matters of protective intelligence.”

“President Bush has all the confidence in the world in the United States Secret Service and our law enforcement and intelligence communities,” said Freddy Ford, a spokesman for Bush.

ABC News’ Mark Osborne contributed to this report.

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(UVALDE, Texas) — Authorities are on scene at an “active shooter” incident at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, the school district said.

The Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District said the shooter was located at Robb Elementary and asked people to stay away from the area.

“There is an active shooter at Robb Elementary,” the school district said on Twitter. “Law enforcement is on site. Your cooperation is needed at this time by not visiting the campus. As soon as more information is gathered it will be shared.”

A school official clarified to ABC News that the shooting took place off campus, but Robb Elementary School is under lockdown.

Parents were being asked to pick up students at Sgt. Willie Deleon Civic Center, according to the Uvalde Police Department.

Uvalde, Texas, is located about 90 minutes west of San Antonio.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

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(UVALDE, Texas) — A suspect has been taken into custody after an “active shooter” incident at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, according to police.

The Uvalde Police Department did not immediately provide further information. It’s unclear whether anyone was injured in the shooting.

Earlier, the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District had said a shooter was located at Robb Elementary School and asked people to stay away from the area.

“There is an active shooter at Robb Elementary,” the school district said on Twitter. “Law enforcement is on site. Your cooperation is needed at this time by not visiting the campus. As soon as more information is gathered it will be shared.”

A school official clarified to ABC News that the shooting took place off campus, but Robb Elementary School was under lockdown.

Students will be transported to be picked up by parents at Sgt. Willie Deleon Civic Center, according to the Uvalde Police Department.

Uvalde, Texas, is located about 90 minutes west of San Antonio.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

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(NEW YORK) — The alleged suspect in the unprovoked fatal shooting of 48-year-old Daniel Enriquez on a Q train in New York City is in police custody, according to law enforcement sources.

Sources identified the suspect as Andrew Abdullah, a 25-year-old man from Brooklyn with about 20 prior arrests, including an outstanding gun charge from last year. He also has prior arrests for assault, robbery, menacing and grand larceny, sources said.

Abdullah has three cases that are still pending, including an April arrest for fourth-degree criminal possession of stolen property for allegedly being found with a stolen motorcycle, as well as a June 2021 arrest for violating a protective order and March 2021 arrest for assault.

Detectives have also recovered the gun used in the shooting.

It is believed the suspect handed the gun to a homeless man as he fled the Canal Street station. The homeless man then apparently sold the gun for $10 to a third person, who reported it to police, the sources said.

The New York Police Department released surveillance photos Monday of the suspect believed to have shot Enriquez taken shortly after he exited the subway.

The motive for the shooting is still unknown.

In January 2020, Abdullah was arrested as part of a gun-related case and in May 2017 he was charged with second-degree attempted murder as part of an 83-count federal indictment of the Harlem-based street gangs Fast Money and Nine Block. Abdullah was sentenced to three years in federal prison, but served just four months before being released in 2019.

Witnesses say the suspect, alleged to be Abdullah, was pacing back and forth in the last car of a Manhattan-bound train around 11:45 a.m. when he pulled out a gun and fired it at Enriquez unprovoked, according to NYPD Chief of Department Kenneth Corey.

The shooting comes a little over a month after a Brooklyn subway rider opened fire on a train car, wounding 10 people. The suspect in that shooting, Frank James, was arrested one day later in lower Manhattan.

Transit crime is up 62.5% in the city year-to-date from 2021, according to NYPD statistics.

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(FAYETTEVILLE, N.C.) — A blue-ribbon Army commission has recommended new names for nine Army bases named after Confederate leaders, including Fort Bragg, which will be recommended to be renamed Fort Liberty, according to a U.S. official, ABC News learned exclusively Tuesday.

Later Tuesday, the Army Naming Commission is expected to formally disclose its recommended names for the bases named after Confederate generals.

Last year, Congress passed legislation that required the renaming of U.S. military installations named after Confederate leaders by 2023.

Congress and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin must approve the nine naming recommendations.

Fort Bragg in North Carolina is currently named after Gen. Braxton Bragg, a senior Confederate Army general. It would be renamed as Fort Liberty, the only one of the bases named after a concept, with eight others being renamed mostly after individuals with ties to Army history.

The other bases to be renamed are Fort Hood in Texas, Fort Rucker in Alabama, Fort Polk in Louisiana, Fort Benning and Fort Gordon in Georgia and Fort A.P. Hill, Fort Lee and Fort Pickett in Virginia.

The panel has recommended that Fort Hood, Texas, be renamed after Richard E. Cavazos, the first Latino to reach the rank of a four-star general in the Army.

Fort Gordon, Georgia, will be renamed after Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Army general who led all allied forces in Europe during World War II and later became president.

Fort Lee, Virginia, will be named after two individuals: Arthur Gregg, a former three-star general involved in logistics — the only living individual for whom a base will be named — and Charity Adams, the first African-American woman to be an officer in the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps.

Fort Pickett, Virginia, will be named after Van Barfoot, who received the Medal of Honor for his heroism during World War II and is of Native American descent.

Fort A.P. Hill, Virginia, will be renamed after Dr. Mary Walker, a physician and women’s rights activist who received the Medal of Honor for her service during the Civil War.

Fort Benning, Georgia, will be renamed after Lt. Gen. Hal Moore, a pioneer in the Air Cavalry whose Vietnam-era story was memorialized in the book and movie, “We Were Soldiers.”

Fort Rucker, Alabama, will be named after Michael Novosel, a Medal of Honor recipient who flew combat aircraft in World War II and the wars in Korea and Vietnam.

Fort Polk, Louisiana, will be renamed after William Henry Johnson, a soldier whose heroism in World War Two was not honored with the Medal of Honor until 2015.

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(NEW YORK) — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is forecasting an above-normal hurricane season in the Atlantic, with up to 21 named storms this year.

Ten storms could become hurricanes, the agency said. Three to six storms may reach category 3, 4 or 5.

2022 may also become the seventh consecutive above-average hurricane season, which runs from June 1 to Nov. 30.

“The increased activity anticipated this hurricane season is attributed to several climate factors, including the ongoing La Niña that is likely to persist throughout the hurricane season, warmer-than-average sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic Ocean and Caribbean Sea, weaker tropical Atlantic trade winds and an enhanced west African monsoon,” NOAA said in a press release.

NOAA predicts a 65% chance of an above-normal hurricane season, a 25% chance of a near-normal season and a 10% chance of a below-normal season.

“As we reflect on another potentially busy hurricane season, past storms — such as Superstorm Sandy, which devastated the New York metro area ten years ago — remind us that the impact of one storm can be felt for years,” NOAA Administrator Rick Spinrad said in a statement.

Spinrad added, “Since Sandy, NOAA’s forecasting accuracy has continued to improve, allowing us to better predict the impacts of major hurricanes to lives and livelihoods.”

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(NEW YORK) — As the search for the woman wanted in connection with the fatal shooting of professional cyclist Anna Moriah Wilson continues, the suspect’s father said he does not think his daughter is capable of the alleged murder.

In an exclusive interview with ABC News’ chief national correspondent Matt Gutman on Good Morning America Tuesday, Michael Armstrong spoke directly to his daughter, Kaitlin Armstrong, saying, “We love you … and we are going to figure this out.”

“I know her and I know how she thinks and I know what she believes and I know that she just would not do something like this,” Michael Armstrong said. “I know her.”

Last week, Austin police issued a warrant for the arrest of Armstrong, 35, on a first-degree murder charge in the fatal shooting of Wilson, 25, who they determined was romantically linked to Armstrong’s boyfriend, professional cyclist Colin Strickland.

Wilson, a rising elite cyclist, was in Austin for a gravel bike race earlier this month when she was found bleeding and unconscious with multiple gunshot wounds at a friend’s home the night of May 11, hours after meeting up with Strickland, police said. Austin police said at the time that the shooting did not appear to be random and they had a person of interest in the incident.

A car resembling Armstrong’s 2012 Jeep Grand Cherokee was captured on surveillance footage from a neighboring residence stopping outside the friend’s home the night of the shooting, according to the arrest warrant affidavit. The likelihood that the gun used in the shooting matched one of two guns Strickland told police he bought for himself and Armstrong was “significant,” the affidavit stated.

When police interviewed Armstrong about the shooting on May 12, she was “confronted with video evidence of her vehicle” but “she had no explanation as to why it was in the area and did not make any denials surrounding the statements,” the affidavit stated. After further questioning, Armstrong requested to leave, according to the affidavit.

Strickland told police he hasn’t seen Armstrong since May 13, according to the affidavit. Armstrong has since deleted her social media accounts and “has not been seen or heard from since this time,” according to the affidavit.

On Friday, U.S. Marshals announced they are helping in the “fugitive investigation” and asked the public’s help in finding Kaitlin Armstrong.

Michael Armstrong said he believes there are “a lot of unanswered questions” in the case.

“I know that she did not do this,” he said.

The U.S. Marshals believe Kaitlin Armstrong may still be in the Austin area, and that finding her Jeep will be key.

“She was a realtor. She was a yoga teacher. So she had personal relationships here in the Austin area,” Deputy U.S. Marshal Brandon Filla told Good Morning America. “We hope that eventually if she had some kind of plan, that maybe she would reach out to those associates, and we would receive a tip based upon that.”

Strickland said he has been cooperating fully with detectives in the investigation.

“There is no way to adequately express the regret and torture I feel about my proximity to this horrible crime,” Strickland said in a statement to ABC News Austin affiliate KVUE. “I am sorry, and I simply cannot make sense of this unfathomable tragedy.”

Strickland explained that after breaking up with Armstrong last year, he had a “brief romantic relationship” with Wilson before shortly resuming his relationship with Armstrong. His relationship with Wilson was “platonic and professional,” he said.

Wilson’s family said in a statement to ABC News that they are “devastated by the loss of our beautiful daughter and sister.”

“Her life was taken from her before she had the opportunity to achieve everything she dreamed of,” they said. “Our family, and all those who loved her, will forever miss her.”

ABC News’ Lissette Rodriguez contributed to this report.

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(NEW YORK) — Police have identified a suspect in connection with the unprovoked fatal shooting of 48-year-old Daniel Enriquez on a Q train in New York City on Sunday, according to police sources.

The sources identified the wanted suspect as Andrew Abdullah, a 25-year-old man from Brooklyn with about 20 prior arrests, including an outstanding gun charge from last year. He also has prior arrests for assault, robbery, menacing and grand larceny, sources said.

Abdullah has three cases that are still pending, including an April arrest for fourth-degree criminal possession of stolen property for allegedly being found with a stolen motorcycle, as well as a June 2021 arrest for violating a protective order and March 2021 arrest for assault.

Detectives have also recovered the gun used in the shooting.

It is believed the suspect handed the gun to a homeless man as he fled the Canal Street station. The homeless man then apparently sold the gun for $10 to a third person, who reported it to police, the sources said.

The New York Police Department released surveillance photos Monday of the suspect believed to have shot Enriquez taken shortly after he exited the subway.

The motive for the shooting is still unknown.

In January 2020, Abdullah was arrested as part of a gun-related case and in May 2017 he was charged with second-degree attempted murder as part of an 83-count federal indictment of the Harlem-based street gangs Fast Money and Nine Block. Abdullah was sentenced to three years in federal prison, but served just four months before being released in 2019.

Witnesses say the suspect, alleged to be Abdullah, was pacing back and forth in the last car of a Manhattan-bound train around 11:45 a.m. when he pulled out a gun and fired it at Enriquez unprovoked, according to NYPD Chief of Department Kenneth Corey.

The shooting comes a little over a month after a Brooklyn subway rider opened fire on a train car, wounding 10 people. The suspect in that shooting, Frank James, was arrested one day later in lower Manhattan.

Transit crime is up 62.5% in the city year-to-date from 2021, according to NYPD statistics.

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(NEW YORK) — When a disgruntled employee opened fire in the parking lot of a FedEx distribution facility in Indianapolis, Indiana, in April 2021, the shooter did so because he wanted to commit “suicidal murder,” an FBI report released Monday concludes.

That incident, according to the FBI, was one of deadliest mass killings that year.

As a whole, active-shooter incidents in the United States increased by more than 50% from 2020 to 2021, according to the report.

Over the past five years, active shooter incidents have steadily increased, the FBI said, with the most recent in Buffalo, New York, on May 14 when a gunman killed 10 Black people at a local supermarket.

That shooting is being investigated as a hate crime.

The new report, titled “Active Shooter Incidents in the United States in 2021,” says there were 61 mass shooting incidents in the U.S. in 2021, representing a nearly 100% increase in active shooter incidents from 2017, which saw 31.

The FBI defines an active shooter as one or more individuals actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a populated area. Implicit in this definition is the shooter’s use of a firearm.

The shootings occurred in 30 states, which saw 103 die and 140 wounded, according to the FBI, which says 12 of the shootings met the “mass killing” definition.

The FBI defines a mass killing as three or more killings in a single incident.

John Cohen, the former acting undersecretary for intelligence and analysis at the Department of Homeland Security, told ABC News that the United States is seeing a trend with active shooters.

“The U.S. is in the midst of a multiyear trend where we are experiencing an increase in mass shooters who are seeking to advance their ideological beliefs or based on a perceived personal grievance,” Cohen, now an ABC News contributor, said. “A growing subset of our population believes that violence is an acceptable way to express one’s ideological beliefs or seek redress for a perceived personal grievance.”

Nearly all of the shooters were male, and half the accused shooters were arrested by law enforcement. The FBI says 55% of the shootings took place in the afternoon and evening hours.

More than half of the shootings took place in areas of commerce.

“The locations range from grocery stores to manufacturing sites,” the FBI said.

The youngest shooter was 12 and the oldest was 67.

“For 2021, the FBI observed an emerging trend involving roving active shooters; specifically, shooters who shoot in multiple locations, either in one day or in various locations over several days,” the FBI concluded.

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(NEW YORK) — Daniel Enriquez, 48, was shot and killed in an unprovoked attack on a Q train Sunday in New York City as it headed into Manhattan. The tragedy comes just a few weeks after a gunman opened fire on an N train subway car during rush hour, shooting and injuring 10 people.

The recent spate of crimes on the city’s public transportation has left the city scrambling for answers as ridership continues to climb back toward pre-pandemic levels and more people return to riding with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

Transit crime is up 58% from this time last year, though April showed a dip in crimes on public transportation, according to New York Police Department data.

When compared with 2020, crime is up only about 1%. However, the amount of transit crime in New York City has remained steady since 2006, with the exception of 2021’s crime dip.

Citywide, crime has gone up since the first two years of the pandemic when the city began to shut down; it’s up 40% from 2021, and 37% from 2020, according to NYPD data.

However, compared to the 80s and 90s, crime is down 72% from 1993, according to city data.

“[Enriquez’s death] just renewed our calls to deal with the proliferation of guns on our street, even after the bullet takes the life of an innocent person, the emotional trauma continues to rip apart the anatomy of our city,” Mayor Eric Adams said in a press conference on Monday.

Adams vowed to address public safety needs following the death of subway rider Michelle Go in January. She was killed after being pushed in front of an oncoming train.

At a press conference following Go’s death, Adams said the attack highlights the importance of those in crisis receiving mental health services to ensure that the city’s streets “above ground and below ground” are safe.

He announced in January that he would deploy more police officers into the subway systems alongside mental health workers, and enforce MTA rules, such as fare enforcement, more strictly.

“[We’ll] just really double down on our concerns that our system must be safe, must be safe from actual crime, which we are going to do and it must be safe from those who feel as though there’s a total level of disorder in our subway system,” Adams said at a Jan. 18 press conference.

At least 1,000 officers were added to the subway’s police force in an attempt to combat crime shortly after the announcement, according to local newspaper AMNY.

Adams has since also placed emphasis on mental health and community building as tools for crime prevention. He also said he hopes to target the prevalence of gun violence and ghost guns as a key issue in the city’s fight against violence.

“By the time someone carries a gun, discharges a gun, we already failed as a city,” Adams said at a May 20 conference, advocating for more community-based services. “Everyone must be on board because we have to prevent as well as apprehend those crimes that are taking place in the city.”

MTA CEO Janno Lieber called Sunday’s fatal shooting “an incredible setback” for the effort to get the city back to normal after the pandemic curtailed ridership.

Still, MTA’s ridership has been seemingly left unaffected by reports of crime, as ridership levels continue to set pandemic-era records, marking the highest totals since March 2020.

“This week, New York reached a milestone in transit ridership, one of the most encouraging indicators that our comeback from COVID is right on track,” New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said in a recent statement on the records. “Public transportation systems are the lifeblood of New York, and we will continue doing everything in our power to bring riders back, helping drive our economic recovery.”

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