FBI Head Says Note and DNA Link Suspect to Charlie Kirk Killing

The man accused of fatally shooting Charlie Kirk wrote a note before the shooting that said he had an opportunity to take out Mr. Kirk and was going to make use of it, the director of the F.B.I. said on Monday.

The director, Kash Patel, said D.N.A. matching that of the suspect, Tyler Robinson, was found on a towel wrapped around the bolt-action rifle that was believed to be used in the shooting, as well as on a screwdriver that was found on the rooftop where the fatal shot was fired.

Speaking on the “Fox & Friends” television show Monday morning, Mr. Patel said that Mr. Robinson had suggested before the shooting that he was going to kill Mr. Kirk, in a text message exchange and in a written note. He said that the note was destroyed but that the authorities were able to reconstruct it.

The killing of Mr. Kirk, 31, a right-wing activist, stunned the nation last week, when he was struck by a single gunshot while speaking to an audience of students at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah. The authorities began an intensive manhunt, and Mr. Robinson turned himself in about 30 hours after the shooting at a sheriff’s office near his home in southwestern Utah, more than 250 miles from the campus.

The motivation for the shooting has been fiercely debated, with investigators and civilians alike scouring the suspect’s online presence and trying to gather information from his friends and relatives.

Gov. Spencer Cox of Utah, a Republican, and Mr. Patel have said people who know Mr. Robinson have told investigators that he subscribed to what the two men called left-wing or leftist ideology.

Mr. Cox has said that the suspect was a normal young man who became “radicalized” after dropping out of college, and that his family was conservative.

The governor also said that a person who was initially described as a roommate of Mr. Robinson’s was actually his romantic partner, and that the person was transitioning from being a man to being a woman. That person, the governor said, has been cooperating with the investigation and was “shocked” by what Mr. Robinson had done.

Friends have described Mr. Robinson as a very smart, if somewhat quiet, person who enjoyed playing video games and took an interest in current events. He was registered to vote but unaffiliated with any political party, and he had no previous criminal history.

Messages that the suspect sent after the shooting, which were obtained by The New York Times, showed that he joked with friends about the fact that he resembled the person being sought by the F.B.I. He said in the messages that his “doppelganger” was trying to “get me in trouble,” and joked that he needed to “get rid of this manifesto and exact copy rifle” that he had lying around.

On Thursday, about nine hours after sending those messages, he turned himself in after his father recognized him in higher quality images released by the authorities.

During the TV appearance on Monday, Mr. Patel promised that no one at the F.B.I. would politicize the investigation. He has faced criticism for posting on social media soon after the shooting that a “subject” had been apprehended; in fact, that person had nothing to do with the shooting and was quickly released.

“Could I have worded it a little better, in the heat of the moment? Sure,” Mr. Patel said on Monday about his post. “But do I regret putting it out? Absolutely not. I was telling the world what the F.B.I. was doing.”