Trump agrees to FBI interview over attempted assassination

Donald Trump will meet with FBI agents to interview the victim as part of the bureau’s ongoing investigation into the recent assassination attempt on the former president, an FBI official said during a briefing on Monday.

The FBI special agent in charge of the case, Kevin Rojek, head of the Pittsburgh field office, told reporters the interview would be “consistent with any other interview with the victim.”

“We provide support to the victim through our victim services and we want to get his perspective on what he saw,” Rojek said. “Just like any other witness to a crime, and also get his perspective on what happened to him during that incident, but it’s a standard victim interview, the kind of interview we would do with any other victim of crime in any other setting.”

Rojek’s statement was part of a broader update the FBI provided on the progress of the investigation into the shooting that occurred at a Trump rally in Pennsylvania on July 13. The FBI is focusing on the shooter, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, who killed one person and critically wounded two during the event. Trump suffered a minor injury when the bullet missed his head by inches and instead grazed his ear.

FBI Assistant Director in Charge Paul Abbate said during a briefing that after more than two weeks, the shooter’s motive “is still not clear” but that the investigation “remains urgent and ongoing.”

Rojek said the bureau’s behavioral analysis unit was still building a profile of Crooks, but stressed that Crooks was a “loner” and that he was “highly intelligent.”

Crooks made 25 online purchases related to firearms starting more than a year ago in the spring of 2023, Rojek said. Crooks also made six online purchases related to precursor chemicals he used to build three explosive devices that agents found in the shooter’s vehicle and home on the day of the attempted bombing, the FBI agent said. He added that Crooks used online aliases to make the purchases.

Rojek said the FBI made legal submissions to 86 different companies regarding various accounts linked to Crooks, with the goal of obtaining his data and the content from those accounts.

“While the FBI investigation has not yet determined a motive, we believe the perpetrator went to considerable lengths to conceal his actions,” Rojek said, adding that the 20-year-old’s actions indicated “careful planning” ahead of the rally.

Crooks had a shooting hobby that evolved into “formal firearms training courses” around the fall of 2023, Rojek said. The AR-15 he used at the rally had a folding stock, an accessory that helps make the weapon more compact, he said.

One piece of information released last week by FBI Director Christopher Wray provides at least some insight into Crooks’s intentions: On July 6, the same day he registered for the Trump rally, Crooks Googled how far away Lee Harvey Oswald was when he shot President John F. Kennedy.

Rojek said that in addition to those searches, Crooks also scoured the internet for power plants, mass shootings, information about improvised explosive devices and a failed assassination attempt on Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico earlier this year.

When FBI agents question Trump, they will add to the more than 450 interviews agents have conducted so far. They have interviewed Crooks’ parents, who Rojek said were “extremely helpful,” and have also interviewed coworkers, former teachers and classmates.

The FBI has primarily focused on determining whether Crooks had accomplices, and Rojek said there is still no evidence he conspired with anyone or received help from anyone.

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The special agent in charge of the case said investigators had identified “only a few people we could call his friends, and most of those contacts were actually dating.”

“Even on his gaming platforms, we see very little interaction with other people, which is obviously outside the norm of what you would normally see, especially among gamers,” Rojek said.