Ken Dilanian Melts Down Over FBI Firing Agent For Downplaying Motive In Baseball Shooting

Alex Christy
May 28th, 2026 11:33 AM

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As hard as it may be for MS NOW justice and intelligence reporter Ken Dilanian to understand, Republicans are still not happy about the FBI downplaying the partisan motivations of the 2017 congressional baseball shooter. Therefore, when the agent involved in that conclusion was fired on Wednesday, Dilanian took to the air to claim the agent was just the latest in a string of FBI officials sacked for “simply doing their job.”

First, Dilanian joined Ana Cabrera Reports and had a hard time understanding why anyone would even consider the original conclusion controversial, “She's now the deputy assistant director, the number two official in charge of FBI intelligence. And she was summarily fired on Friday through a letter from FBI Director Kash Patel and walked out of the building. We're told, in part because she worked nine years ago as a much more junior analyst on this intelligence assessment, which I was about to say, controversial. It's only controversial among a certain segment of Republicans.”

 

 

He continued with a bit of a Freudian slip, “Our sources are telling us this is the latest example of a career FBI official being fired for simply doing their jobs, following the facts as they understood them. They assessed back then that this shooter, even though he was clearly targeting—he was angry at Republicans. He had a list of Republican lawmakers in his pocket, but they assessed at the time that this was more of a suicide by cop situation.”

Yes, he was “clearly targeting” Republicans, which is why Republicans have angrily denounced the suicide by cop explanation. Nevertheless, Dilanian concluded, “Now, later information came to light, and they changed the criteria for how they would label things domestic terrorism. And they, a few years later, they said, 'You know what, under today's rules, we would label that domestic terrorism.' But House Republicans have been furious about that ever since. They issued a report earlier this year criticizing the way the FBI handled this. And now they have a scalp. A senior FBI official walked out of the building because she worked on this assessment many, many years ago.”

“Later information” is a nice way of saying “changed under pressure.” Still, a few hours later, Dilanian suggested to Katy Tur that Republicans had a simple disagreement with the FBI, “That wasn't a political act by the FBI. That was just a disagreement. It was just a career, people doing their jobs. And that's what's different about this, is you have this woman, she's supposedly protected by civil service rules, and she's only supposed to be fired for cause. But yet she's marched out of the building on Friday simply because of her involvement in an intelligence assessment that Republicans disagreed with.”

 

 

Again, he conluded by warning:

And so it just shows that what it does is it creates a cascading effect, because now other career officials, the reason we heard about it is they look at this and they're horrified by this. They see that people who are just assigned to work on cases, who did their job, whether it was investigations of Donald Trump or this thing from nine years ago, they are losing their jobs over this in a way that the FBI Agents Association believes is illegal. They don't think that these firings are on the level. And what they—what my sources say, what Kash Patel and what the Trump White House wants are sycophants who are just willing to do their bidding and not exercise independent judgment about law enforcement.

Dilanian did not join Deadline: White House, but host Nicolle Wallace quoted his reporting while trying to claim GOP criticisms were a mere “partisan grudge”:

FBI Director Kash Patel has done it again. He has reportedly ousted another analyst over a partisan grudge. That's according to brand new reporting from our own Ken Dilanian. This grudge is almost a decade old. It ties back to the 2017 Republican congressional baseball shooting. The FBI analyst, deputy assistant director Emily Morales, played a role in the FBI's report that did not label the shooting an act of domestic terrorism, which upset House Republicans. Ken Dilanian's sources tell him that 'her removal was widely perceived inside the bureau as the latest in a series of firings of nonpartisan FBI agents who did their jobs in a way that drew disfavor from Donald Trump or Republicans.’ Now the FBI is down yet another experienced agent, and by our count, those numbers are stacking up. 

 

 

That says more about Dilanian’s sources than it does Republicans or Kash Patel. The truth is that if someone who expressed his hatred for Democrats shot a bunch of Democratic politicians practicing for a charity baseball game, MS NOW would not only demand people call it an act of terrorism, but blame Republicans or conservative media for creating an environment that enabled the shooter.

Here are transcripts for the March 27 shows:

MS NOW Ana Cabrera Reports

5/27/2026

10:52 AM ET

KEN DILANIAN: She's now the deputy assistant director, the number two official in charge of FBI intelligence. And she was summarily fired on Friday through a letter from FBI Director Kash Patel and walked out of the building. We're told, in part because she worked nine years ago as a much more junior analyst on this intelligence assessment, which I was about to say, controversial. It's only controversial among a certain segment of Republicans.

And again, our sources are telling us this is the latest example of a career FBI official being fired for simply doing their jobs, following the facts as they understood them. They assessed back then that this shooter, even though he was clearly targeting—he was angry at Republicans. He had a list of Republican lawmakers in his pocket, but they assessed at the time that this was more of a suicide by cop situation.

Now, later information came to light, and they changed the criteria for how they would label things domestic terrorism. And they, a few years later, they said, “You know what, under today's rules, we would label that domestic terrorism.” But House Republicans have been furious about that ever since. They issued a report earlier this year criticizing the way the FBI handled this. And now they have a scalp. A senior FBI official walked out of the building because she worked on this assessment many, many years ago.

***

MS NOW Katy Tur Reports

5/27/2026

3:05 PM ET

KEN DILANIAN: So now the deputy is out because of her involvement with this intelligence analysis from nine years ago, this 2017 shooting. And look, I mean, you could disagree with it. The House Republicans published a thorough analysis earlier or last year, March of last year, where they criticized how the FBI handled it.

And they said that the conclusion that this was suicide by cop was bogus because this guy, remember, he criticized Republicans, this shooter, and he had the names of Republican lawmakers in his pocket. And the FBI later acknowledged that under the changed definition of domestic terrorism today, they would call that an act of domestic terrorism.

This guy was an extremist, but that wasn't a political act by the FBI. That was just a disagreement. It was just a career, people doing their jobs. And that's what's different about this, is you have this woman, she's supposedly protected by civil service rules, and she's only supposed to be fired for cause.

But yet she's marched out of the building on Friday simply because of her involvement in an intelligence assessment that Republicans disagreed with. And I don't even think this was a priority of Donald Trump. This was really something that came from The Hill. And Senator Grassley and others have been really adamant about this.

And so it just shows that what it does is it creates a cascading effect, because now other career officials, the reason we heard about it is they look at this and they're horrified by this.

They see that people who are just assigned to work on cases, who did their job, whether it was investigations of Donald Trump or this thing from nine years ago, they are losing their jobs over this in a way that the FBI Agents Association believes is illegal. They don't think that these firings are on the level. And what they—what my sources say, what Kash Patel and what the Trump White House wants are sycophants who are just willing to do their bidding and not exercise independent judgment about law enforcement.

***

MS NOW Deadline: White House

5/27/2026

4:55 PM ET

NICOLLE WALLACE: FBI Director Kash Patel has done it again. He has reportedly ousted another analyst over a partisan grudge. That's according to brand new reporting from our own Ken Dilanian. This grudge is almost a decade old. It ties back to the 2017 Republican congressional baseball shooting. The FBI analyst, deputy assistant director Emily Morales, played a role in the FBI's report that did not label the shooting an act of domestic terrorism, which upset House Republicans. Ken Dilanian's sources tell him that 'her removal was widely perceived inside the bureau as the latest in a series of firings of nonpartisan FBI agents who did their jobs in a way that drew disfavor from Donald Trump or Republicans.” Now the FBI is down yet another experienced agent, and by our count, those numbers are stacking up. 

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