Dan Proft interviewed Thomas Baker, a retired FBI special agent and legal attaché, and author of The Fall of the FBI: How a Once Great Agency Became a Threat to Democracy, to discuss the FBI’s investigation into Thomas Crooks, the would-be assassin of President Donald Trump. Baker expressed concern over the Bureau’s handling of the case, suggesting that a lack of transparency and apparent incompetence only fuel public suspicion.
Proft first highlighted the contradiction between earlier public claims by then-FBI Director Christopher Wray and Deputy Director Paul Abbate—that Crooks was a mystery man with a thin online presence—and recent reporting by Miranda Devine and Tucker Carlson. These reports, based on extensive online footprints, detail Crooks’ accounts on multiple platforms (YouTube, Snapchat, Discord, etc.) and posts that included violent rhetoric, such as “murder the Democrats” in 2019, followed by a shift in 2020 to anti-Trump and anti-government sentiments, including suggestions for “terrorism style attacks.”
The host noted that the New York Post editorial board had called for a fresh investigation into Crooks’ back trail, possible co-conspirators, and the FBI officials who initially “dropped the ball.”
Thomas Baker stated that the new information reflects “very poorly” on the FBI. He offered two primary explanations for the missed information:
- Incompetence and Lack of Interest: Baker suggested that, because the target was Trump and the shooter was dead (meaning there would be no trial), agents may have simply not cared enough to conduct a thorough investigation.
- Conspiracy: Given the Bureau’s loss of credibility under the last three directors, Baker noted that the lack of transparency is now causing people to suspect a cover-up.
Baker emphasized that the current leadership must continue the investigation to determine if there were any co-conspirators and must “make it all available to the public, air it out. Fresh air is the best disinfectant.” He stated that this case should be studied for future learning, as Crooks appears to have been a “very disturbed youth” with similarities to John Hinckley, who attempted to assassinate President Reagan.
Baker, who was involved in the investigation of Hinckley’s attempted assassination of President Reagan, contrasted the FBI’s response then with the current handling of the Crooks case.
- Hinckley Investigation: Took “literally a matter of weeks that stretched into a matter of just a few months.” Investigators meticulously back-traced Hinckley’s entire preceding life, including his attempts to get near then-President Carter and his other activities. The comprehensive review quickly led to a “pretty solid conclusion that he acted alone.”
- Crooks Investigation: Baker criticized FBI Director Kash Patel’s public statement on X, which used high numbers of agents and pieces of evidence to conclude that Crooks “acted alone and nobody he didn’t disclose to anybody and nobody knew that he was going to do this.” Baker argued that this blanket statement does more harm than saying nothing, especially given the reporting of online chats and the quick change in the shooter’s political views, which suggests possible online recruitment or radicalization.
Baker stressed that the Bureau should have been proactive in keeping the public informed, and that the fact that private media contacts (Carlson and Divine) had to uncover this information first is “a disgrace.”
Thomas Baker’s book, The Fall of the FBI: How a Once Great Agency Became a Threat to Democracy, details his concerns about the agency’s decline.