The FBI spent years trying to repair damage from its zealous pursuit of Donald Trump, but then Director Christopher A. Wray suggested that a would-be assassin’s bullet didn’t actually strike Mr. Trump.
Mr. Wray twice suggested in testimony to Congress last week that “shrapnel” may have bloodied the former president’s right ear.
The FBI backtracked on that suggestion Friday night.
“What struck former President Trump in the ear was a bullet, whether whole or fragmented into smaller pieces, fired from the deceased subject’s rifle,” the bureau said in an unattributed statement from its press office.
Still, the damage was done.
“It’s disappointing but not surprising that the same FBI that’s spent the last eight years targeting President Trump would engage in this kind of baseless conspiracy-mongering,” said Rep. Thomas Tiffany, Wisconsin Republican.
SEE ALSO: FBI hasn’t interviewed Trump about assassination attempt
Mr. Wray’s assessment contradicted the gunshot victim, the emergency room doctors who treated Mr. Trump, his former White House physician who has been tracking the case and even The New York Times, which conducted an analysis of photos and audio and concluded that the first bullet fired grazed the former president’s right ear.
In the initial reporting of the shooting, some accounts said the former president was struck by flying glass, perhaps from a teleprompter. Mr. Trump, though, quickly took to social media to say it was a bullet that hit him.
He said the bullet could have killed him had his head been turned a quarter of an inch.
Thomas J. Baker, the first FBI agent on the scene of President Reagan’s shooting in 1981, called Mr. Wray’s foray into the bullet-shrapnel issue “puzzling.”
“His throwing out that doubt about this — that question should have been resolved at the crime scene within hours,” said Mr. Baker, author of “The Fall of the FBI.”
He said the FBI should have interviewed Mr. Trump early because he was a “victim-witness” of the July 13 shooting.
SEE ALSO: Rep. Michael McCaul says report on Trump assassination attempt could be out by end of year
Mr. Wray chose a poor time to pick a fight with the former president’s version of events.
As Congress held hearings last week on the assassination attempt, Republicans denounced the FBI.
“We have no confidence in the FBI,” House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chairman James Comer, Kentucky Republican, said as he opened the first hearing with Kimberly Cheatle, the Secret Service director at the time.
Ms. Cheatle resigned Tuesday, a day after her disastrous performance at the hearing.
Mr. Wray showed up on Capitol Hill determined to do better. Where Ms. Cheatle waffled and demurred, Mr. Wray promised to be as open as possible, even in areas where his investigation was still open.
He offered lawmakers some intriguing bits of information, such as the multiple visits the shooter made to the rally site, his use of a drain pipe to reach his rooftop sniper’s perch and his purchase of ammunition.
Twice during the lengthy hearing, Mr. Wray cast doubt on questions about a bullet that struck Mr. Trump.
“With respect to former President Trump, there’s some question about whether or not it’s a bullet or shrapnel that, you know, that hit his ear,” Mr. Wray said in response to a question from Chairman Jim Jordan, Ohio Republican.
That was news to Rep. Ronny Jackson, a Texas Republican who served as White House physician for 14 years and has visited Mr. Trump since the shooting. He said he was tracking the medical case and that the ear injury had all the markings of a bullet wound.
“There is absolutely no evidence that it was anything other than a bullet,” Mr. Jackson said on social media. “Director Wray is wrong and inappropriate to suggest anything else.”
He pointed out that was the conclusion of the emergency room doctors, who labeled the injury a “gunshot wound” in their report.
The New York Times said it conducted an analysis of photos and audio and bullet trajectories and concluded that Mr. Trump was grazed by the first shot taken by the gunman.
Other bullets killed one rallygoer and critically wounded two others.
The FBI and Mr. Trump had tangled since the 2016 election season when the bureau wiretapped a Trump campaign adviser and pursued a now-discredited investigation into a Trump-Russia conspiracy.
An inspector general said the FBI’s investigation was inappropriate.
In 2017, Mr. Trump fired FBI Director James B. Comey, which helped spark a Justice Department special counsel investigation. That probe faulted Mr. Trump for the firing but found no evidence of a Russia-Trump conspiracy.
Before the election in 2020, the FBI knew the Hunter Biden laptop was authentic but kept silent as the Biden campaign organized an effort to discredit the computer as Russian disinformation.
At Wednesday’s hearing, Mr. Wray acknowledged lingering issues to Mr. Tiffany, who pointed out that an FBI contractor had drafted a questionnaire, apparently for an internal investigation of a bureau employee, that inquired about “support for President Trump” and “objection” to the coronavirus vaccination.
Mr. Wray said the form was “completely inappropriate.” He said the contractor is “no longer affiliated with the FBI” and he has alerted the Justice Department inspector general to the incident.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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