FBI Director Kash Patel thought he was finally putting the Thomas Crooks controversy to rest. Instead, a high-profile Fox News Digital exclusive about the near assassination of President Donald Trump has led to a fresh wave of anger inside Trump’s own base, with prominent MAGA influencers accusing Patel of orchestrating a new “cover up.”
Patel and his deputy, Dan Bongino, sat down at FBI headquarters for a lenghty interview with Fox reporter Brooke Singman, walking her through what they described as an “unprecedented global investigation” into the July 2024 assasination attempt of Trump in Pennsylvania. Officials said they conducted thousands of interviews, seized more than a dozen devices, and pulled apart data from dozens of accounts before concluding that 20 year old Thomas Matthew Crooks acted alone.
Patel then took to X to lay out the bureau’s work. “Dan and I sat down with @BrookeSingman to walk through every aspect of the Butler investigation,” he wrote. “We fully briefed @POTUS on the entire case, and he was satisfied with the work and the results. These are the details the prior administration never released, and in some cases never even pursued. This @FBI has redoubled its efforts to provide the American people with full, factual transparency about this tragic attack.”
But instead of reassurance, MAGA world responded with open hostility. Many of Trump’s supporters rejected Patel’s findings, accusing the FBI director of overlooking red flags and rushing to shut down any further questions.
The loudest backlash came from Tucker Carlson, who has made Crooks’ background and motives one of his pet investigations. Carlson has repeatedly claimed the FBI downplayed or ignored Crooks’ digital footprint. On X, he wrote, “The FBI told us Thomas Crooks tried to kill Donald Trump last summer but somehow had no online footprint. The FBI lied, and we can prove it because we have his posts. The question is why?”
Carlson and others have circulated screenshots they say show Crooks’ hidden online activity, including violent imagery, extremist rhetoric, and long running hostility toward Trump. To them, Patel’s insistence that Crooks acted alone, with “limited online and in person interactions,” sounds like a carefully crafted half truth rather than the full picture.
The FBI fired back with a response as a newly launched Rapid Response account publicly called Carlson’s claim false, insisting the bureau never said Crooks had no online footprint. Patel has pointed to the massive scale of the investigation, noting that hundreds of FBI personnel collected and reviewed nearly half a million digital files.
Still, the skepticism remained fierce as MAGA podcaster Kyle Seraphin mocked Patel’s Fox News sit-down and accused the FBi director of a cover-up. Others questioned why the interview was granted to a friendly outlet and why certain details, including the fast cremation of Crooks’ body was not explained.
Cool story. No one believes you… and… pic.twitter.com/hnftQrcz8d
— Kyle Seraphin (@KyleSeraphin) November 21, 2025
Patel and Bongino say they have finally delivered full transparency and that Trump himself was “satisfied” with the findings. Yet some of the president’s most loyal supporters are not satified with the results and want Patel to step down.
Patel has become very unpopular among MAGA, a movement that once championed. Trump supporters and skeptics in general are convinced that the investigation and a friendly Fox News reveal cannot answer their lingering questions about what really happened on that Pennsylvania rooftop. This comes as Patel continues to face critism over his handling of the Epstein files and his apparent use of the FBI jet for personal use.
