Kevin Rojek, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Pittsburgh field office, said the bureau reached out to Trump and he agreed to the meeting. It’s unclear when it will take place, CBS News reports. “We want to get his account of what he observed,” he said. “This is a standard interview of a crime victim.”
The FBI is investigating the July 13 shooting at a Trump campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, and has already conducted 450 interviews. As part of efforts to determine the motive of the shooter, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, the bureau is requesting information from 86 companies, including gaming platforms, social media platforms and messaging apps, Rojek said. The gunmen opened fire on the crowd with an AR-style rifle, wounding Trump and two others and killing one bystander. He was killed by a Secret Service sniper, and federal authorities are continuing to investigate the shooter and his actions leading up to the attack. The FBI has not yet found a motive and believes the gunmen acted alone, with no accomplices, officials reiterated Monday.
FBI Director Chris Wray told lawmakers last week that while there is still no “clear picture” of the shooter’s motives, investigators believe he focused on Trump and the Butler rally about a week before the attack. The FBI analyzed a laptop associated with Crooks and found that he had conducted a Google search for “how far was Oswald from Kennedy,” a reference to Lee Harvey Oswald, who assassinated President John F. Kennedy in 1963. According to Ray, on the day he conducted his online search, July 6, Crooks had registered to attend the Trump rally.
FBI agents also found a total of three explosive devices: two were in Crooks’ car and one was in his home. The FBI chief told the House Judiciary Committee that the shooter had a transmitter that would have allowed him to remotely detonate explosives in his car, but the bombs’ receivers were turned off. The FBI told reporters that in addition to seeking information about the Kennedy assassination, Crooks was also looking for information about power plants, improvised explosive devices, mass shootings and the attempted assassination of Slovak Prime Minister Fico in May.
