(Ken Silva, Headline USA) CNN reported Friday that the FBI wants to interview presidential frontrunner Donald Trump about the attempt against his life at the July 13 campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
According to CNN, the FBI just wants a victim statement—a standard part of the investigation because he is a crime victim.
“The FBI also said in a statement Thursday that investigators continue to examine bullet fragments and other evidence in the attack on Trump at his Pennsylvania rally this month, but that the agency has always considered the shooting an attempted assassination of the former president,” CNN reported.
While CNN painted the interview as innocuous, FBI Director Chris Wray expressed doubt that Trump was shot at a Wednesday congressional hearing—raising questions of whether investigators will be looking to grill Trump about the event. The FBI has been known to arrest people simply for making contradictory statements during interviews.
“My understanding is that it [the bullet], or some shrapnel, is what grazed his ear, so I don’t know if I have the answer to that,” Wray said Wednesday.
“As I said, with respect to former President Trump, there’s some question about whether or not it’s a bullet or shrapnel that hit his ear,” Wray later said when asked again about the matter.
Wray was widely criticized for his remarks, including by Trump.
“Wray told Congress yesterday that he wasn’t sure if I was hit by shrapnel, glass, or a bullet (the FBI never even checked!), but he was sure that Crooked Joe Biden was physically and cognitively ‘uneventful’ – Wrong!” Trump posted Thursday on Truth Social, also referencing Wray’s comments about not noticing Biden’s cognitive decline.
“No, it was, unfortunately, a bullet that hit my ear, and hit it hard. There was no glass, there was no shrapnel. The hospital called it a ‘bullet wound to the ear,’ and that is what it was. No wonder the once storied FBI has lost the confidence of America!”
Trump’s former White House physician, Rep. Ronny Jackson, R-Texas, also released a doctor’s note following the shooting confirming that Trump had been shot in the ear by a bullet.
Jackson immediately blasted the remarks by Wray, calling it “absolutely irresponsible” and “politically motivated.”
“What little credibility he may have left is GONE after recklessly suggesting Trump might not have been hit from a bullet,” Jackson wrote on his Twitter/X page. “IT WAS A BULLET — I’VE SEEN THE WOUND!”
Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/jd_cashless.