FBI Director Chris Wray Wednesday announced he plans to steps down as President-elect Trump prepares to replace him once he takes office next month.
In an announcement at an all-hands meeting of FBI employees at its Quantico, Virginia headquarters, Wray said he will leave office when President Biden leaves the White House.
“The right thing for the (FBI) is for me to serve until the end of the current administration in January and then step down,” Wray said. “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 hailed the FBI and sounded wistful about the decision to resign.
“I love this place, I love our mission and I love our people,” he said.
Trump has already announced plans to nominate MAGA hardliner Kash Patel as the next FBI director even though Wray has two years left on his 10-year term in office.
Wray’s resignation clears one potential obstacle to Patel’s taking over the helm of the nation’s top law-enforcement agency. He still needs to win Senate confirmation.
Trump, who showered praise on Wray when he appointed him in 2017, has recently repeatedly slammed Wray as a tool of the so-called “deep state” that he claims has “weaponized” the justice system against himself and his conservative supporters.
The president-elect was particularly angered by the FBI’s role in executing a court-approved search of his Mar-a-Lago home that turned up hundreds of classified documents he improperly took with him after the end of his first term.
Wray was appointed after Trump fired his predecessor James Comey over his involvement in the investigation into ties between the 2016 Trump campaign and Russia.
