Trump to be questioned as part of investigation into attempted assassination

Jul 30, 2024 12:05 PM • Last update: Jul 30, 2024 12:05 PM

Congressman Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio, listens as U.S. Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle testifies before the House Oversight and Accountability Committee on the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump during a campaign event in Pennsylvania, at the Capitol in Washington, Monday, July 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Rod Lamkey, Jr.)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former President Donald Trump has agreed to be questioned by the FBI as part of the investigation into the attempted assassination attempt on him in Pennsylvania earlier this month. A special agent said Monday that the attacker had researched mass attacks and explosive devices before the shooting.

The much-anticipated interview with the 2024 Republican presidential candidate is part of the FBI’s standard protocol for talking to victims during criminal investigations. The FBI said Friday that Trump was struck in the ear by a bullet or shrapnel during the attempted assassination attempt on July 13 at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.

“We want to get his perspective on what he saw,” said Kevin Rojek, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Pittsburgh field office. “This is a standard victim interview, the kind we would do with any other crime victim under any other circumstances.”

Trump said in an interview with Fox News aired Monday night that he expects the FBI interview to take place on Thursday.

Through more than 450 interviews, the FBI developed a profile of the shooter, Thomas Matthew Crooks, that reveals him to be a “highly intelligent” but introverted 20-year-old whose primary social circle was his family and who maintained few friends or acquaintances throughout his life, Rojek said. Even on online gaming platforms Crooks frequented, his interactions with peers appeared to be minimal, the FBI said.

His parents were “exceptionally helpful” in the investigation, Rojek said. They said they had no prior knowledge of the shooting.

The FBI has not discovered a motive for targeting Trump, but investigators believe the shooting was the result of extensive planning, including the purchase of precursor chemicals under a false name in recent months that investigators say were used to create the explosives found in his car and home, and the use of a drone about 200 yards (180 meters) from the rally in the hours before the event.

According to the FBI, the day before the shooting, Crooks visited a local shooting range and practiced firing the weapon that would be used in the attack.

After the shooting, authorities found two explosive devices in Crooks’ car and a third in his room at home. The devices recovered from the car, consisting of ammunition boxes filled with explosives with wires, receivers and ignition devices, could have detonated but did not because the receivers were in the “off” position, Rojek said. It is not known how much damage they could have done.

The FBI said Crooks had shown an interest in high-profile public figures online in the days leading up to the shooting, searching for information about individuals including President Joe Biden. In addition, Rojek said, Crooks searched for information about mass shootings, improvised explosive devices, power plants and an assassination attempt on populist Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico in May.

FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress last week that on July 6, the day Crooks registered for the Trump rally, he typed into Google, “How far was Oswald from Kennedy?” That was a reference to Lee Harvey Oswald, the gunman who killed President John F. Kennedy from a sniper’s perch in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963.

Meanwhile, new details have emerged about security lapses and undelivered communications leading up to the shooting.

Senator Chuck Grassley, the ranking Iowa Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, released text messages from members of the Beaver County Emergency Services Unit that showed local officers communicating with each other about a man acting suspiciously, who turned out to be Crooks, lurking more than an hour before the shooting.

One text, written just before 4:30 p.m., described a man “sitting directly to the right on a picnic table, approximately 50 yards from the exit.”

In another text at 5:38 p.m., an officer tells other countersnipers, “The kid is studying in the building we’re in. AGR, I think. I saw him with a rangefinder looking toward the stage. FYI. If you want to notify the SS snipers to watch out. I lost sight of him.” Photos of Crooks circulated among the group.

AGR is a reference to the complex of buildings that make up AGR International Inc., a supplier of automation equipment to the glass and plastic packaging industries. Crooks climbed onto the roof of one of the buildings in the complex and is believed to have fired eight shots at the scene from an AR-style rifle that had been legally purchased by his father years earlier.

According to the Beaver County accident report, the shots were fired at 6:12 p.m.

Trump said he was “shot by a bullet that went through the upper part of my right ear” and emerged days later with a bandage on his ear. One rallygoer, Corey Comperatore, was killed and two others were wounded. Crooks was shot by a Secret Service countersniper.

In an interview with ABC News, the Beaver County police officer who raised the alarm said that after sending a text message warning others about Crooks, he “assumed someone was going to come talk to this individual or find out what was going on.”

Another officer told ABC News the group was supposed to have a face-to-face meeting with Secret Service anti-snipers, but it never happened.

An email sent to the Secret Service seeking comment was not immediately returned Monday.