Two months after abruptly firing FBI Director James Comey in 2017, President Trump nominated a new leader for a 10-year term, Christopher Wray, a former top Justice Department official who the president said would serve as “a fierce guardian of the law and model of integrity.” As Trump ran for reelection in 2020, he groused that Wray should announce he was investigating his Democratic challenger, Joe Biden, and that Wray was not doing enough to help his reelection efforts. Trump continued to castigate Wray both during and after his first term in the White House, making claims that the FBI and main Justice Department were plotting against him a cornerstone of his successful 2024 campaign, the Washington Post reports.
As Trump returns to power, an open question surrounds the bureau: Will the president once again fire an FBI director, or would Wray resign before giving him the chance? Wray’s main concern is ensuring there are minimal disruptions to the bureau during the transition from the Biden to the Trump administration. He is booking his schedule well into 2025, giving no indication that he plans to resign. In April, Wray was asked by NBC's Lester Holt about Trump’s vow to prosecute political enemies and whether he would serve as FBI director under Trump. “I’m going to make sure that as long as I’m the FBI director we do the right thing in the right way. That means following the rules, following the law,” Wray responded. “I’m enjoying doing this job. As long as I think I can do that in a way that adheres to all those rules and norms, I’d like to keep doing it.” The FBI director’s 10-year tenure was imposed as a post-Watergate reform effort in 1976. Before that, the first FBI director, J. Edgar Hoover, served as the bureau’s head for about four decades until his death in 1972. In 2017,
Wray walked into “a very challenging situation,” said Greg Brower, a former FBI official The challenge has continued, with the FBI leading the investigations into Trump's alleged hoarding of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago and his alleged efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
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