Christopher Wray as FBI Director is a Disgrace

If you’ve ever seen Christopher Wray giving testimony to Congress, you might think of him as just a nice guy: mostly courteous, deferential and forthcoming. But you would be wrong on all counts. And those are only a few of the reasons that Trump wants to fire him.

At this point, Wray has said he wants to keep his job for which he has two more years on his contract. In spite of Trump’s protests about his performance, Wray has said nothing about retiring.

Why does Trump hold him in such disdain?

Let’s start with the assassination attempt on Trump’s life at the outdoor campaign rally in Butler, PA. When Wray testified to the House Judiciary Committee, he misrepresented what had happened. Some people would say he lied. This is what Wray said, in part:

Wray, whom Trump nominated to head the FBI in 2017, testified Wednesday about his agency’s investigation into the assassination attempt, and said, ‘I think with respect to former President Trump there’s some question about whether or not it’s a bullet or shrapnel that, you know, hit his ear.’ He said the investigation into the shooting, which is being led by the FBI, is ‘very much ongoing.’

Seriously? Why would Wray make this statement? Was he trying to downplay the seriousness of the shooting, so that we would doubt our own eyes? So that Trump would doubt his own reaction? I think Wray intended to mislead the public.

Then there is the investigation into Joe Biden and his family. After an extensive inquiry, the House Oversight Committee received only limited cooperation from the FBI; members of the committee were allowed to view a relevant but unclassified document, but were not permitted to have a copy of it. The committee decided to hold Wray in contempt:

Comer and other Republicans claim the document is tied to their investigation alleging Biden, as vice president under President Obama, engaged in a bribery scheme with a foreign national. The Biden White House slammed the claims. ‘This is yet another fact-free stunt staged by Chairman Comer not to conduct legitimate oversight, but to spread thin innuendo to try to damage the president politically and get himself media attention,’ a White House spokesman, Ian Sams, said in a statement.

Since the referenced document was not even classified, the FBI was clearly stonewalling the committee and likely trying to protect Joe Biden and his family in the process.

Let’s not forget the time that Wray and his people went after devout Catholics. The attack began in one FBI office, but eventually spread to others:

‘FBI Richmond assesses the increasingly observed interest of racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists (RMVEs) in radical-traditionalist Catholic (RTC) ideology almost certainly presents opportunities for threat mitigation through the exploration of new avenues for tripwire and source development,’ the memo said, describing purported overlap between Catholics who oppose abortion rights and other policies and would-be terrorists. [Jim] Jordan sparred with Wray over the matter during a testy House Judiciary hearing last month, during which the FBI chief insisted the memo was a ‘single product by a single field office.’

Wray was lying again.

An analyst in the FBI Richmond office, however, thought the following evidence was convincing:

The intelligence product, dated Jan. 23, 2023, written by an analyst in the Richmond Field Office, equated ‘Radical-Traditionalist Catholics’ with ‘Racially or Ethnically Motivated Violent Extremists (RMVE).’ These supposedly dangerously bigoted Catholics attend Mass in Latin and are critical of liberal reforms in the church, according to the FBI analyst who equated their beliefs with ‘anti-Semitic, anti-immigrant, anti-LGBTQ and white supremacist ideology.’ The evidence the analyst provided for this slander was farcical: a report from the far left Southern Poverty Law Center and tendentious media articles, such as from left-wing Salon (‘White nationalists get religion: On the far-right fringe, Catholics and racists forge a movement’) and The Atlantic (‘How Extremist Gun Culture Is Trying to Co-opt the Rosary’).

Sounds pretty damning, doesn’t it? (Pardon my sarcasm.)

Finally, Wray demonstrated his contempt for Congress in the last couple of weeks:

Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.) said both Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and FBI Director Christopher Wray ‘refused to appear’ before the panel for its annual hearing about threats to the homeland, saying it was the first time in 15 years officials have done so. ‘Americans deserve transparent, public answers about the threats we face. Secretary Mayorkas and Director Wray’s refusal to speak publicly about their department’s work will only increase the concerns that many Americans have about our nation’s security at a challenging time, flout the Committee’s efforts to conduct responsible oversight, and will deal a serious blow to trust in our government. Their claims that they can only relay such information and respond to questions in a classified setting are entirely without merit,’ Peters said in a statement.

Since Mayorkas and Wray had previously undergone grueling testimonies before committees of Congress, and both know they won’t be included in the Trump administration, it’s not surprising that they pushed back and refused to appear.

It will be interesting to see whether Wray will resign with dignity before he’s fired.

I wouldn’t count on it.