FBI Director Christopher Wray is stepping down before the end of his 10-year term, after President-elect Donald Trump made clear he would fire him in favor of a loyalist intent on shaking up the bureau.
Wray told employees Wednesday he would resign before the new Trump administration begins.
“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 during a town hall for the workforce.
Trump chose Wray for the post in 2017, but the former president soured on him and the bureau more broadly after years of federal investigations into his conduct. Wray, a fellow Republican, tried to keep the spotlight on the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s other work but instead watched it become further entangled in partisan politics.
His decision to step aside comes weeks after Trump said he would nominate a replacement: Kash Patel, a hard-line critic of the FBI who, echoing the president’s own criticism of the bureau, has said he would shrink its power, close its Washington headquarters, fire its top ranks and seek to prosecute agents he accuses of corruption.
Patel’s bombastic approach stands in contrast to that of Wray, a restrained and circumspect leader who has stressed the bureau’s independence and defended his workforce as dedicated to objectivity and the rule of law.
“Those fundamental aspects of who we are must never change,” Wray said in the town hall. “It’s an unshakable foundation that’s stood the test of time and cannot be easily moved.”
Republicans, who once supported the FBI as the party of law and order, for years have accused the FBI of zealously targeting conservatives. Wray has called that charge “somewhat insane to me considering my own personal background.”
Trump’s breaking point with Wray came in August 2022, after a team of FBI agents conducted an unprecedented search of his Mar-a-Lago residence in search of classified documents they determined he had refused to relinquish. Trump continues to describe that extraordinary move—which was approved by Wray, the Justice Department and a federal judge—as an assault on his home.
“He invaded my home, I’m very unhappy with the things he’s done,” Trump said in an interview with NBC’s “Meet The Press” that aired Sunday.
Deputy Director Paul Abbate, an FBI veteran, will likely take the helm of the bureau for several months before his own long-planned retirement in April.
For now, it remains unclear when—or if—Patel would secure Senate confirmation for the post. He has been meeting with GOP senators in a campaign to shore up support for his nomination. Some Republicans already have said they are inclined to back him, including Sen. John Cornyn of Texas.
But some national security officials who served in the Trump administration say they believed Patel is unqualified for the job. In an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday, Trump’s former national security adviser, John Bolton, said Patel had placed “obedience to Mr. Trump above other, higher considerations,” including the U.S. Constitution.
Trump’s broader animosity toward the FBI dates back to its investigation into whether his campaign was involved with Russian interference in the 2016 election, a probe eventually led by special counsel Robert Mueller. Mueller concluded there was no criminal conspiracy, and watchdog inquiries that followed found serious flaws in the way the FBI handled that investigation. Wray ordered a litany of changes to how the bureau seeks secret surveillance warrants and handles other matters but could never fully satisfy Trump’s allies on Capitol Hill.
Before their relationship fractured, Trump and Wray saw eye-to-eye on a range of pressing issues, including the national security threat posed by China. In 2022, Trump watched Wray appear on “60 Minutes” and was so impressed he sent the FBI director a handwritten fan note.
“Great job,” Trump wrote in black Sharpie marker, according to a copy of the previously unreported note reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. “You are 100% correct on China (Russia is not so wonderful either!). Best wishes, Donald”
Wray earned praise inside the bureau and on Capitol Hill for much of the FBI’s day-to-day work, going after violent criminals and gangs, helping companies respond to a blizzard of cyberattacks, and tackling an increasingly diverse set of threats from terror groups, domestic and abroad. Every time a local police officer was killed in the line of duty, he would call their department to offer sympathies.
Still, the political nature of some of the FBI’s most high-profile investigations, including those into Trump and his allies, cast a shadow over much of his tenure.
Almost a year after the Mar-a-Lago search, special counsel Jack Smith charged Trump with illegally retaining classified information and other crimes. A judge dismissed the case in July. Smith also brought a second case against Trump related to efforts to undo his 2020 election loss. He dropped the case after Trump won the November election, as Justice Department rules bar the prosecution of a sitting president.
Adding to the complexity of Wray’s relationship with Trump, the former president this year dealt with the FBI as a victim of a crime, after a gunman nearly assassinated him at a campaign rally in Butler, Pa. At a press conference soon after, Trump said he thought the FBI had “done a very good job” interviewing him after the attack. But he still fumes at Wray for initially expressing uncertainty about whether Trump had actually been grazed by a bullet during the assassination attempt.
Vice President-elect JD Vance in November let slip that he and Trump had been interviewing candidates to replace Wray, writing in a now-deleted social-media post that they were searching for a candidate who would “dismantle the deep state.”
While agents disagreed about the effectiveness of Wray’s low-key leadership style, many employees could never stomach Trump’s continual beratement of their boss. Aside from Trump, most presidents allow the FBI director to stay for the duration of their 10-year-terms. Wray’s was set to end in 2027 under a law aimed at shielding the FBI from political influence.
