Thomas Matthew Crooks never cried when he was born. He rarely spoke, never made a close friend, and spent nearly five years teaching himself to shoot with increasing precision. By July 13, 2024, the 20-year-old had climbed onto a rooftop in Butler, Pennsylvania, and fired at former President Donald Trump, striking him in the ear, killing rallygoer Corey Comperatore, and wounding two others.
Newly released FBI interview documents, obtained by the New York Post through Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley's inquiry, paint a picture of a young man whose emotional blankness unsettled even his own father. The documents draw from interviews the FBI conducted with Crooks' father, Matthew, and shed light on the shooter's social isolation, his methodical firearms training, and the digital steps he took to cover his tracks before the attack.
Matthew Crooks told FBI agents that his son's silence began at the very start of his life. The elder Crooks described a boy who was difficult to read and who showed almost no outward emotion throughout childhood and adolescence.
"When Thomas was born he did not scream and he was always quiet from that point on."
That observation, drawn from the FBI interview documents, set the tone for what followed. Thomas Crooks scored a near-perfect 1500 on the SAT, placing him in the upper tier of academic ability. But his intellectual capacity did not translate into social connection. His father told agents that Thomas never identified anyone as a friend throughout middle school and high school.
The contrast between raw intelligence and near-total social withdrawal is a detail investigators have flagged as they try to understand what drove Crooks to act. As Just the News reported, the FBI documents reveal a young man who existed in a kind of emotional vacuum, one that left his family unable to anticipate what he would do.
One of the more striking details from the elder Crooks' interview concerns his son's stated political views. Matthew Crooks told agents that Thomas called himself a Republican but held a selective, almost contradictory set of positions.
"Thomas called himself a Republican. Thomas did not like the welfare state and was against the woke ideology but never really espoused the Republican ideology."
That description has complicated efforts to assign a clear political motive to the shooting. Crooks registered as a Republican voter but did not appear to embrace the party's platform in any consistent way. Investigators have not publicly confirmed a definitive motive for the assassination attempt, and the FBI's final assessment found no evidence that ideology, foreign direction, or outside influence drove his actions.
The question of motive matters well beyond this case. Threats against political leaders have become a persistent concern for federal law enforcement, as illustrated by the federal charges brought against an Ohio man for alleged death threats targeting Trump and a Republican congressman.
Crooks did not pick up a rifle and suddenly become dangerous. The FBI documents describe a progression that spanned four to five years. He began at a local gun club unable to hit a paper target. Over time, he improved to the point where he could accurately strike targets at distances beyond 100 yards using a prism sight.
That level of skill did not come from casual range visits. It reflected sustained, focused practice. On the day of the shooting, Crooks borrowed the rifle from his father under the guise of going to the shooting range, a routine request that raised no alarm.
The weapon itself was not the only thing Crooks prepared. He used the pseudonym "Bob Dole" to receive Amazon shipments of gun parts, tools, and items designed to increase his rifle's capacity. Breitbart reported that the reason Crooks chose that particular alias remains unknown. Investigators have not said whether the name carried any personal significance or was chosen at random.
Crooks took deliberate steps to obscure his online activity before the attack. He used encrypted email providers, VPNs, and privacy-focused browsers. He maintained foreign-based email accounts registered in Germany and Belgium, a detail that initially fueled speculation about possible overseas connections.
That speculation proved unfounded. The FBI ultimately accessed all 35 accounts linked to Crooks, along with 13 electronic devices. Fox News reported exclusively that the bureau's investigation debunked claims of encryption barriers that had circulated in the weeks after the shooting.
A senior FBI official stated the conclusion in blunt terms: "There is no foreign connection in this case. There is no individual that is outside U.S. borders or inside U.S. borders that had any role in directing him, inspiring him or assisting him in any way, and that includes foreign governments."
The bureau's ability to crack Crooks' phone was itself a significant early step. The Washington Examiner confirmed that FBI specialists successfully accessed the device and began analyzing its contents in the days following the shooting.
The FBI deployed 485 employees to the case in some capacity. Agents conducted more than 1,000 interviews worldwide, reviewed 2,000 tips, executed more than 10 search warrants, and issued over 100 subpoenas. FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino pushed back against suggestions of institutional foot-dragging or concealment.
"There is no cover-up here. There is no motive for it, there is no reason for it."
FBI Director Kash Patel and Bongino both confirmed the investigation's central finding: Crooks acted alone. No co-conspirators, no handlers, no foreign government involvement. The probe's global reach, touching multiple countries and dozens of digital accounts, was designed to rule out every plausible theory of outside assistance.
That conclusion does not resolve every question. Investigators have not publicly explained why Crooks chose the Butler rally as his target or what triggered his final decision to act. The absence of a clear motive remains one of the case's most frustrating gaps, both for law enforcement and for the public.
The FBI's findings about Crooks' preparation raise hard questions about how a 20-year-old with no criminal record, no known associates, and no clear ideological commitment managed to get within rifle range of a former president. The Secret Service's own failures at Butler have been the subject of separate scrutiny, including an inspector general's finding that agents missed 102 radio warnings about a potential gunman before the shooting.
Those security breakdowns exist alongside a broader pattern of escalating threats against political figures. Federal prosecutors have pursued cases ranging from a plot to kill Treasury Secretary Bessent to alleged foreign assassination schemes targeting U.S. personnel overseas. The Butler shooting sits at the extreme end of that spectrum: a lone actor who succeeded in reaching his target.
The FBI interview records with Matthew Crooks provide a detailed portrait of the shooter's development but do not fill in the central blank. Investigators have not determined why a young man with a near-perfect SAT score, no friends, and no discernible passion for any political cause decided to attempt an assassination.
Authorities have not publicly confirmed whether Crooks left behind any written statement, manifesto, or private communication explaining his intent. His digital footprint, despite spanning 35 accounts and 13 devices, apparently yielded no clear declaration of purpose.
The elder Crooks' description of his son as emotionally flat from birth offers a psychological data point, not an explanation. It tells investigators what Thomas Crooks was like. It does not tell them what he wanted.
When a man with no motive anyone can find nearly kills a president, the system did not just fail at the perimeter. It failed at every level designed to see trouble coming.
