WASHINGTON: Nearly two weeks after the near-assassination of Donald Trump, the FBI confirmed on Friday that it was indeed a bullet that struck the former president's ear, moving to clarify conflicting accounts of what caused the former president's injuries after a gunman opened fire at a rally in Pennsylvania. .
“What struck former President Trump in the ear was a bullet, whole or fragmented into smaller pieces, fired from the deceased subject's rifle,” the agency said in a statement.
The FBI's statement marked the most definitive law enforcement account of Trump's injuries and followed ambiguous comments earlier in the week by director Christopher Wray that appeared to cast doubt on whether Trump was actually hit by a bullet.
The comment sparked anger from Trump and his allies and further fueled conspiracy theories that have flourished on both sides of the political aisle amid a lack of information since the July 13 attack.
So far, federal law enforcement agents involved in the investigation, including the FBI and Secret Service, have repeatedly refused to provide information about what caused Trump's injuries. Trump's campaign also refused to release medical records from the hospital where he was first treated or make doctors there available for questions.
The updates came either from Trump himself or from Trump's former White House doctor, Ronny Jackson, a staunch ally who now represents Texas in Congress. Although Jackson has treated Trump since the night of the attack, he has undergone considerable scrutiny and is not Trump's primary physician.
The FBI's apparent reluctance to immediately vouch for the former president's version of events — along with the anger he and some supporters have directed at the bureau in the wake of the shooting — has also raised new tension between the candidate Republican and the nation's top federal law enforcement agency. , over which he could soon exercise control again.
Trump and his supporters have repeatedly accused federal law enforcement of being armed against him.
Questions about the extent and nature of Trump's injury began immediately after the attack, as his campaign officials and law enforcement officials refused to answer questions about his condition or the treatment he received after Trump narrowly escaped death in an attempted of assassination by a gunman with a tall body. motorized rifle.
Those questions persisted despite photos showing traces of a projectile speeding past Trump's head, photos showing the glass of Trump's teleprompter intact after the shooting, and the account Trump himself gave in a Truth Social post hours later after the shooting, saying he was “shot. with a bullet that pierced the top of my right ear.”
“I immediately knew something was wrong as I heard a hiss, gunshots and immediately felt the bullet break through the skin,” he wrote.
Days later, in a nomination acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Trump described the horrific scene in detail while wearing a large white gauze bandage over his right ear.
“I heard a loud hiss and felt something hit me very, very hard in my right ear. I was like, “Whoa, what was that? It can only be a bullet,'” he said.
“If I hadn't moved my head at the very last moment,” Trump said, “the assassin's bullet would have landed perfectly and I wouldn't be here tonight.”
But the first medical report on Trump's condition didn't come until a full week after the shooting, when Jackson released his first letter last Saturday night. In that letter, he said the bullet that struck Trump “produced a 2 cm wide wound that extended to the cartilaginous surface of the ear.” He also revealed that Trump received a CT scan at the hospital.
But federal law enforcement involved in the investigation, including the FBI and Secret Service, declined to confirm that account. And Wray's testimony offered seemingly conflicting answers on the issue.
“There is some question as to whether or not it was a bullet or shrapnel that hit his ear,” Wray testified, before appearing to suggest that it was indeed a bullet.
“I don't know if that bullet, in addition to causing the graze, could have landed anywhere else,” he said.
The next day, the FBI tried to clarify matters with a statement saying the shooting was an “attempted assassination of former President Trump that resulted in his injury, as well as the death of a heroic father and injuries to several other victims.” . The FBI also said Thursday that its shooting reconstruction team continues to examine bullet fragments and other evidence at the scene.
Jackson, who has treated the former president since the night of the July 13 shooting, told The Associated Press on Thursday that any suggestion that Trump's ear was bloodied by anything other than a bullet was reckless.
“It was a bullet wound,” Jackson said. “You cannot make such statements. It leads to all these conspiracy theories.”
In his letter on Friday, Jackson insisted there was “absolutely no evidence” that Trump was hit by anything other than a bullet and said it was “wrong and inappropriate to suggest otherwise.”
He wrote that at Butler Memorial Hospital, where the GOP candidate was rushed after the shooting, he was evaluated and treated for a “Gunshot wound to the right ear.”
“Having served as an emergency medicine physician for over 20 years in the United States Navy, including as a combat medic on the battlefield in Iraq,” he wrote, “I have treated many gunshot wounds in my career. Based on my direct observations of the injury, my relevant clinical experience, and my significant experience in evaluating and treating patients with similar injuries, I fully agree with the initial assessment and treatment provided by the nurses at Butler Memorial Hospital on the day of the shooting .”
The FBI declined to comment on Jackson's letters.
Asked if the campaign would release those hospital records or allow doctors who treated him there to speak, Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung criticized the media for asking.
“The media has no shame in engaging in disgusting conspiracy theories,” he said. “Facts are facts, and to call into question a heinous assassination attempt that ultimately cost one life and injured two others is incomprehensible.”
In emails last week, he told the AP that “medical indications” had already been provided.
“It's sad that some people still don't believe there was a shooting,” Cheung said, “even after one person was killed and others were injured.”
Anyone who believes in conspiracies, he added, “is either mentally deficient or is intentionally peddling lies for political reasons.”
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R.C., a close Trump ally, also urged Wray to correct his testimony in a letter to the FBI director on Friday, saying the fact that Trump was hit by a bullet ” it was clarified in the briefings received by my office. and it should not be a point of contention.”
“As head of the FBI, you should not create confusion about such matters because it further undermines the agency's credibility with millions of Americans,” he wrote.
Trump also attacked Wray in a post on his Truth social network, saying “No wonder the FBI of old has lost faith in America!”
“No, it was unfortunately a bullet that hit my ear and hit it hard. There was no glass, there was no shrapnel,” he wrote.
On Friday, he called Wray's comments “so damaging to the great people who work in the FBI.”
Jackson has faced significant scrutiny over the years.
After giving Trump a medical in 2018, he grabbed headlines for suggesting that “if he had a healthier diet for the last 20 years, he could live to be 200.”
He was reportedly demoted by the Navy after the Defense Department's inspector general released a scathing report into his conduct as a top White House physician that found Jackson made “sexual and derogatory” comments about a female subordinate and took prescription sleep medication. raised concerns from his colleagues about his ability to provide adequate medical care.
Trump appointed Wray in 2017 to replace fired James Comey as FBI director. But the then-president quickly soured on his hiring as the bureau continued its investigation into Russian election meddling.
Trump openly flirted with firing Wray as his term neared its end and struck again after the FBI executed a search warrant at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida to recover boxes of classified documents from his presidency.
