GOP-led committee criticizes FBI investigation into 2017 congressional baseball shooting
WASHINGTON (Gray DC) - A congressional committee report released Tuesday accused the FBI of jumping to conclusions and misconstruing information in their investigation of the 2017 congressional baseball shooting.
“Our report lays out that the FBI investigation was inconsistent with proper procedures and was ed by flawed intelligence analysis," said Rep. Rick Crawford (R-AR), the chair of the Intelligence Committee, which released the report.
Republicans, who lead the committee, have long been critical of the FBI’s investigation into the shooting because it initially characterized the shooting as a “suicide by cop” event rather than an act of domestic terrorism.
The shooter, 66-year-old James Hodgkinson, fired over 70 rounds at Republican of Congress at the baseball practice on June 14, 2017. He was brought down by Capitol Police in a gunfight then later died in the hospital. Five people were injured in the shooting including House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA).
“He went there with the intention of killing all of us on the baseball field, and he had a list in his pocket of other Republicans he wanted to kill. It was very politically motivated, and it was clear they suppressed a lot of facts,” said Rep. Scalise on Tuesday morning.
Years later in 2021, the FBI called the shooting a domestic terrorism event.
The new report relied on more information that was made available after the new FBI director Kash Patel released the shooting case file to the committee.
In the report released Tuesday, the committee concluded that the FBI used “false statements, manipulation of known facts, and biased and butchered analysis to ” the narrative that the shooter committed suicide by cop.
“We have a long way to go to rebuild and reestablish the trust in the confidence of the American people in the FBI, the DOJ, and our intelligence community. This starts that process,” said Rep. Ronny Jackson, (R-TX).
The full report can be found here.
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