FBI Director Christopher A. Wray announced Wednesday that he would resign at the end of the Biden administration, stepping down as the leader of the powerful law enforcement bureau before President-elect Donald Trump takes office and can fire him.
Wray’s resignation comes seven years into his 10-year term – a tenure that is meant to span multiple administrations and is intentionally longer than other executive branch appointments to avoid politicization of the FBI. Trump announced last month that he would nominate loyalist Kash Patel to serve as FBI director, sending a message to Wray that he should either resign or prepare to be fired.
Patel has echoed Trump’s calls for retribution against perceived enemies, and has called for using federal law enforcement to prosecute both political opponents and journalists. His looming nomination, along with Wray’s decision to resign, underscores the reality that the Trump administration will attempt to obliterate long-standing norms at the FBI and dramatically reshape the bureau.
**Best for the bureau**
Wray announced his plans at a town hall with the FBI workforce Wednesday afternoon, telling his employees that while it was a hard decision to cut his term short, he believed it was the best one for the bureau. It was an emotional meeting, according to an FBI official, and Wray’s announcement was met with a long-standing ovation from his staff. After the town hall, Wray shook hands with many of the FBI employees in the room.
“My goal is to keep the focus on our mission – the indispensable work you’re doing on behalf of the American people every day. In my view, this is the best way to avoid dragging the bureau deeper into the fray, while reinforcing the values and principles that are so important to how we do our work,” Wray said, according to excerpts released by the FBI.
“It should go without saying, but I’ll say it anyway – this is not easy for me,” he continued. “I love this place, I love our mission, and I love our people – but my focus is, and always has been, on us and doing what’s right for the FBI.”
Trump exulted in Wray’s announcement Wednesday, writing on social media that it was “a great day for America.”
If an FBI director steps down or is fired, the bureau’s deputy director generally takes over while a permanent director awaits Senate confirmation. Wray’s deputy, Paul Abbate, is a respected veteran of the bureau. But he is nearing retirement, and it’s unclear whether he or someone else will be the deputy director when Trump becomes president and Wray steps down.
Wray took over as FBI director in 2017, appointed by Trump during his first term after Trump fired James B. Comey from the job. Trump turned on Comey as the bureau investigated whether Trump associates had coordinated with Russia to interfere in the 2016 presidential election.
**Widespread threats**
Wray has overseen the bureau at a time of widespread threats. He has warned in numerous speeches about the danger posed by cyberattacks from China. And he has addressed Congress and others about threats of violence from within the United States against public and law enforcement officials, including his own FBI agents.
“In a heightened threat environment, Director Wray has worked tirelessly to protect the American people and to lead an agency of 38,000 dedicated public servants, many of whom put their lives on the line every day to serve their communities,” Attorney General Merrick Garland, to whom Wray reports, said in a statement.
The Senate voted overwhelmingly to confirm Wray as FBI director in 2017, on a 92-5 vote. The five votes against his nomination were all Democrats. Among them was Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who said she couldn’t vote for someone Trump appointed because she feared the director would not be independent enough from the president.
But throughout his confirmation hearing and tenure, Wray has said he would not pledge his loyalty to Trump. He has repeatedly pushed back against critics of the FBI, trying to assure the public that the bureau is apolitical and that its employees conduct their work by the book.
“If I am given the honor of leading this agency, I will never allow the FBI’s work to be driven by anything other than the facts, the law and the impartial pursuit of justice, period, full stop,” Wray said during his confirmation hearing. “My loyalty is to the Constitution and to the rule of law. Those have been my guideposts throughout my career, and I will continue to adhere to them no matter the test.”
Wray was a senior Justice Department official under President George W. Bush and a lawyer in private practice when Trump tapped him to succeed Comey.
**Not doing enough**
Trump soon soured on his new pick, complaining about the FBI director’s support for the Justice Department’s investigation into Russian interference, among other things. In 2020, while running for reelection, Trump complained that Wray was not doing enough to help his campaign and weighed firing him.
But he didn’t, and Wray went on to serve for the entirety of the Biden administration, further incurring Trump’s wrath as Wray’s agents launched two high-profile investigations into the former president himself. The first focused on Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified documents, and the second examined his wide-ranging efforts to overturn Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory.
Both investigations led to federal indictments. But the classified documents indictment was dismissed this summer by a federal judge in Florida who ruled that special counsel Jack Smith had been unlawfully appointed. And the election-interference case was dismissed late last month at the request of Smith, who said he stood by the facts of the indictment but recognized that Trump had won this year’s election and that long-standing Justice Department policy prohibits prosecuting a sitting president.
Trump and his allies criticized Wray and the FBI especially sharply after agents conducted a court-approved search for classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s home and private club. Their incendiary rhetoric prompted violent threats against the FBI, with Wray confiding to senior law enforcement officials that he was very angry about the attacks, The Washington Post reported at the time.
**Acted illegally**
In his social media post Wednesday, Trump said that under Wray’s stewardship, the bureau had acted illegally in searching Mar-a-Lago. He added, without elaborating, that agents had “used their vast powers to threaten and destroy many innocent Americans.”
Testifying on Capitol Hill last year, Wray said it was “somewhat insane to me” to suggest he was biased against conservatives, given that he was a Republican appointed by another Republican.
Initial reaction by lawmakers to Wray’s resignation split along partisan lines, with Democrats warning of the potentially dangerous precedent set by ousting an FBI director and Republicans cheering what they saw as the start of a new era at the bureau.
“As the FBI’s leader, Chris Wray has always prioritized the mission of the FBI over politics,” Sen. Mark R. Warner, D-Va., who chairs the Senate Intelligence Committee, said in a statement. “Throughout his tenure as Director, he has worked to ensure that the Bureau remains independent and focused on its essential responsibilities to protect the American people and uphold the rule of law.”
Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, a longtime Wray critic who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, called the director’s departure “an opportunity for a new era of transparency and accountability at the FBI.”
**‘Stonewalling Congress’**
“Future FBI Directors ought to learn a lesson from Wray’s mistakes,” Grassley wrote in a statement. “Stonewalling Congress, breaking promises, applying double standards and turning your back on whistleblowers is no longer going to cut it.”
Wray has been viewed within the bureau as a steady presence, broadly regarded by career staffers as someone who understood how the bureau operates and who has defended the institution amid Republican attacks. During his tenure, he has visited the FBI’s 55 field offices across the country multiple times. His supporters say he has forged strong relationships with career staffers and the local and state law enforcement agencies that work with the FBI.
“It was always business,” said Chuck Wexler, who said he speaks to Wray regularly as executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum, whose membership includes top state and local law enforcement officials. “He was always talking about cybercrime, or artificial intelligence or crime. There was never a sense of partisanship.”
Natalie Bara, president of the FBI Agents Association, thanked Wray for his support and leadership on Wednesday after he announced his resignation.
“FBI Special Agents will always be focused on our vital mission – protecting this great nation, safeguarding communities and upholding the U.S. Constitution,” Bara said in a statement. “This commitment is at the core of who we are as Special Agents, and it does not waver when there are changes in a presidential administration or when the leadership in the Bureau changes.”
In an interview broadcast Sunday, Trump declined to say whether he was planning to fire Wray but expressed displeasure with the law enforcement leader on several fronts. “I can’t say I’m thrilled with him,” Trump said on “Meet the Press.” “He invaded my home. … He invaded Mar-a-Lago. I’m very unhappy with the things he’s done.”
**Lobbed criticisms**
Trump lobbed other criticisms at Wray during the interview, at one point claiming falsely that crime was “at an all-time high,” even though crime has fallen in cities and communities across the country. He also faulted Wray’s remark to Congress this summer that there were questions about whether “a bullet or shrapnel” struck the once-and-future president during an assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania.
Wray’s comment enraged Trump and his supporters, and the FBI released a statement soon after saying Trump was indeed struck by a bullet or bullet fragments.
“I have a lot of respect for the FBI,” Trump said. “But the FBI’s respect has gone way down over the last number of years.”