Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton is blasting the FBI over what he calls a "drip-drip" document release tied to the July 2024 assassination attempt on President Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania — after the bureau said that, at its current processing rate, fully releasing roughly 75,000 pages of records could take 12 years.
Fitton made the remarks to Fox News Digital, telling the outlet that under the FBI's timeline, the public would not even be able to challenge what the bureau withheld for more than a decade.
"They are telling us that at current processing rates, the process will take 12 years. Under the FBI's timeline, we won't even be able to challenge what they withheld until 12 years from now. That is obviously unacceptable, and I would like to know what leadership at the FBI and DOJ think about that position," Fitton told Fox News Digital.
Judicial Watch sued the Justice Department in 2025 after the FBI initially rejected a July 2024 Freedom of Information Act request for records concerning the FBI investigation of Thomas Matthew Crooks, the gunman who opened fire at the Butler rally. That shooting killed firefighter Corey Comperatore and wounded two other attendees, while a bullet clipped Trump's ear.
What the Documents Show So Far
The lawsuit has forced the release of several batches of records to Judicial Watch. According to Fox News Digital, the most recent release included text messages Crooks sent to an unknown recipient whose name the FBI redacted before turning the material over.
The messages, sent between May 2023 and January 2024, were brief — one or two words each — and appeared unrelated and largely nonsensical. Among the texts quoted in Fox News Digital's reporting: "Hello … Hello red …Hello red … Hdudhdbdbbd … 7888ejdj … Yolo … Ddodjjf … 890 … Hdjd … Djdj … red … Yup red … Hello … Jhhhuuh … Hhdj … Jjjjjjjjjjjj … Hello red … Red red."
Fitton said the redaction of the recipient's identity is the part that concerns him most.
"We're receiving these documents because they're part of the investigation, yet we're not being told who he was talking to," Fitton told Fox News Digital. "Withholding that information is a very concerning decision. The American people want to be certain this isn't another JFK situation. By handling it this way, authorities are creating the appearance of a cover-up. In part, that's true, because they aren't providing details about who Crooks was talking to, who was texting him, what they were saying, or who witnessed specific actions. It makes no sense to withhold this."
A Court Fight Over Speed, Not Just Access
Judicial Watch is now pressing for the court to accelerate the release schedule. Fitton said the public interest in how a former president came within an inch of being killed — and how two Americans were killed and wounded at the same rally — outweighs the privacy interests of anyone being shielded in the documents.
"Unless the court speeds up the process, all we can do is speak out publicly to pressure the FBI and the Department of Justice to take ownership and stop" the slow-walking, Fitton told Fox News Digital.
The FBI has not publicly responded to Fitton's characterization of the processing timeline. It is not known whether the bureau has offered the court a firm schedule for completing the remaining pages, or whether DOJ leadership has reviewed the 12-year estimate Fitton described.
Meanwhile, roughly 27 months have passed since the Butler shooting, and the core questions the public has asked since that day — who was Crooks talking to, what did the FBI know before the rally, and why was the roof of the AGR building left unsecured — remain only partially answered through court-ordered releases.
Our Take
Twelve years. That is the number the FBI put on the table when Americans asked a simple question: what happened in Butler?
Let's put that timeline in perspective. A kid with a rifle climbed onto a roof with a direct line of sight to a former president and a crowd of thousands. A father was killed. Two men were seriously wounded. The president was shot. And the bureau's answer to a FOIA request is that the paperwork will be ready around 2038 — long after the next several election cycles, long after most of the people demanding answers have moved on, and conveniently long after anyone in a position of responsibility today has left government.
Fitton is right to call it unacceptable, and he is right about the deeper problem. Redacting the name of the person Crooks was texting is not a paperwork issue. It is the single most important unanswered question in the entire case, and the FBI is treating it like a clerical footnote. If there is an innocent explanation — a friend, a family member, someone who has already been interviewed and cleared — then say so and release it. The longer the bureau hides the name, the more it feeds the very suspicion officials claim they want to dispel.
The Deep State's favorite weapon has never been a lie. It is delay. Bureaucratic foot-dragging lets the establishment run out the clock while calling anyone who notices a conspiracy theorist. That is exactly what is happening here, and it is why Judicial Watch's lawsuit matters more than any press conference.
Patriots, keep the pressure on. Demand that the FBI and DOJ answer one question in plain English: who was Thomas Crooks texting? Call your representatives. Share this story. The families of Butler deserve the truth — and they deserve it in this decade, not the next one.
