Kash Patel stood stone faced and silent as authorities in Utah gave a critical update in the manhunt for the assassin who shot and killed political influencer Charlie Kirk. 

Utah’s Republican Governor Spencer Cox presented a video of the shooter fleeing the scene on Thursday night and urged the public to help track down the killer. 

The FBI director, who flew to Utah for the briefing, did not take questions or address the public. 

The former MAGA podcaster and current spy chief has come under increasing scrutiny over the blunders at the bureau in the aftermath of the brutal killing at Utah Valley University.

Law enforcement has arrested three people in connection with the shooting, and released them all as they frantically searched for the killer. 

In the hours after the murder, Patel wrongly said a suspect was in custody while critics have blasted him for gutting the FBI’s leadership in Salt Lake City. 

Political activist George Zinn was arrested at the scene and dragged away after he said he shot Kirk. He was then charged with obstruction.

The Daily Mail also watched on Thursday as agents escorted veteran Jason Christopher Hartley from his home and questioned him in connection with the shooting, but he was also released without charge. 

But like the two men who were named persons of interest on Wednesday, Hartley was quickly allowed back to his home to his wife and two young children.

‘I did not kill Charlie Kirk,’ he told Daily Mail after he had been questioned. 

FBI Agent Scott Kaul, part of a team surveilling the veteran’s home on Thursday afternoon, confirmed to Daily Mail that Hartley is a person of interest in Kirk’s murder, but said he is just ‘one of many’ in the high-profile assassination probe.

As an indication of the investigation’s shortcomings, a top public safety official in Utah said they ‘have no idea’ whether the assassin was even in the state. 

During Thursday’s press conference, Patel was mocked on social media for appearing like a deer in headlights. 

‘Don’t worry guys Kash Patel is clearly on the case,’ one critic wrote on X. ‘I mean look at how he checks every last nook and cranny in the press conference room to see if the assassin might actually be there with them.’ 

Another called out Patel’s silence directly: ‘He flew all the way there and didn’t say a word. I don’t get it! Something else is going on!’ 

‘Zero questions and zero talking from Kash Patel. WTAF?’

Patel reportedly held an expletive-laden conference call with more than 200 FBI personnel Thursday morning as he decried the search for the killer as a ‘Mickey Mouse operation’. 

He slammed employees he said hadn’t given him up-to-date information and claimed the local FBI didn’t show him a photo of the suspected killer for 12 hours, The New York Times reported. 

A White House source, granted anonymity to discuss internal discussions, told Reuters that Patel’s botched announcement about the supposed suspect was unprofessional. 

The source said ‘his performance is really not acceptable to the White House or the American public’ and will be addressed. 

The White House said Patel had Trump’s backing and described Reuters’ reporting as despicable ‘when there’s a crazed killer still on the loose’.

‘This is a despicable story from anonymous sources clearly trying to sow distrust amongst the President’s team during a time of utmost unity,’ White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told Reuters. 

‘Kash Patel is leading the manhunt to catch the killer of our friend, and everyone is supporting him and trying to be as helpful as possible during this effort, including the President of the United States.’

Patel faced heat earlier Thursday after it surfaced that he fired the ‘legendary’ special agent in charge of Utah‘s FBI division just a month before she would have led the ongoing manhunt for Kirk’s assassin. 

The special agent in charge in Salt Lake City, Mehtab Syed, was pushed out of the role in August, despite former agents saying she was ‘absolutely the best’ in the bureau. 

‘Truly a humble servant leader who treats co-workers like family,’ former FBI agent Christopher O’Leary, an MSNBC national security contributor who worked with Syed, told NBC. 

‘And she’s a legendary case agent who was involved in some of the most significant national security cases of the last two decades,’ he added. 

Syed was fired just six months after she was appointed in February, with sources telling NBC that the reasons for her sacking were not clear. 

Associate Deputy Director J. William Rivers, who works for Patel and Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino, reportedly told Syed that she wasn’t a good fit for the office. 

Syed was instead offered a lower-level job in the FBI field office in Huntsville, Alabama, but she decided to retire rather than take the demotion following a distinguished career. 

She previously held a number of significant FBI roles including head of cyberterrorism and counterterrorism in the Los Angeles field office, a section chief in counterintelligence at FBI headquarters, and assistant legal attaché in Pakistan during the height of the U.S. war against Al Qaeda. 

It comes as the country waits for any concrete updates on the killer’s whereabouts after nearly 36 fruitless hours searching.  

Utah Department of Public Safety Commissioner Beau Mason told NBC News they have ‘no idea’ whether the suspect in Kirk’s shooting is still in Utah or across state lines.

‘We have no idea,’ Mason said when asked whether Kirk’s suspected shooter may still be close to the site of the shooting or even within state lines.

‘We’re exploring leads for individuals that live close by,’ he continued. ‘We literally have persons of interest, tips coming in on the tip line, that are spanning far and wide.’ 

The Utah Dept. of Public Safety has released additional images of the person of interest in Kirk’s assassination.

They show the suspect wearing a dark, long sleeved shirt with an American flag on the chest, a gray baseball cap and sunglasses.

He also carried a black backpack as he went up and down the stairs.

Newly-released surveillance footage shows the suspect in Kirk’s assassination running across the roof of a building on campus.

Other surveillance footage shows the suspect dramatically fleeing across a rooftop before jumping down an estimated 10ft to the ground, leaving behind palm and forearm imprints. Officials said ‘a lot’ of forensic evidence is being studied in state and federal labs. A shoe impression may aid the investigation. 

‘We cannot do our job without the public’s help right now,’ Utah Gov. Spencer Cox said at a news conference Thursday night, adding that authorities have already received over 7,000 tips and have conducted more than 200 interviews. 

Authorities said their suspect is a college-aged male with a high level of proficiency in handling firearms and a likely familiarity with the university campus in Utah.

Experts say he is ‘no amateur’ after having reviews footage of him limping towards the college campus – possibly with his rifle hidden down his jeans.

New video recorded just before the assassination shows the suspect limping through a quiet neighborhood towards the campus where Kirk was shot. He is seen hobbling across a street while appearing to keep his hand in his pocket.

The shooter is believed to have escaped via a residential neighborhood. Authorities have suggested that his escape method suggests that he is athletic and physically fit as they try to build up a profile.

Investigators later found a high-powered, bolt-action Mauser .30-06 calibre rifle wrapped in a towel in a nearby wooded area. 

It is now being analyzed at an FBI laboratory in Virginia for clues such as fingerprints and DNA that could help in his arrest. 

There was a spent cartridge still in the chamber and three unspent rounds in the magazine, an early bulletin circulating widely among law enforcement officials said.

The bulletin claimed that there was wording on the rounds, though Justice Department officials are cautioning that it might not accurately reflect the messages on the ammunition. It had been claimed the bullets were engraved with messages promoting ‘transgender and anti-fascist ideology’.

On Thursday, a senior official said that initial reports about the ammunition ‘might turn out to have been misread or misinterpreted’. Officials with the Justice Department reiterated that the probe was in its early stages and investigators were still analysing evidence.

Analysts from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) still have not verified the early report, which does not match other summaries of evidence, a senior law enforcement official with knowledge of the investigation said.

A Utah Valley University student said he witnessed a man walking on the roof of the building where a sniper shot and killed Charlie Kirk weeks before the assassination.

The unnamed student said that a man was either on or near the Losee Center roof twice in the past two weeks, looking down at the courtyard where Kirk held his event Tuesday.  

He admitted that, while he wasn’t certain, photographs released of the suspected shooter ‘looked familiar.’

The student described the man on the roof as a ‘tall, skinny-ish white dude [who] had dark hair. He had this backpack on and was wearing dark clothes. 

‘It was weird,’ he told CNN, noting that seeing someone on that part of the Losee Center was not typical.  

His final sighting of the person on the roof happened at noon on Wednesday, six days before Kirk was brutally killed.  

After the shooting, he described what he’d seen to the FBI’s tipline, but has not yet heard back. The Daily Mail has reached out to the FBI for comment.   

Vice President JD Vance stood front and center as Kirk’s coffin was loaded off a hearse in Salt Lake City on Thursday.

Vance then led members of the National Guard in carrying the mahogany casket up the steps of Air Force Two at Roland R. Wright Air National Guard Base. The aircraft was used to return Kirk’s body to his home state of Arizona.

Vance boarded the flight alongside Kirk’s grieving wife, Erika, their two young children, and his parents – all of whom stood together in silence as the solemn tribute unfolded.

Upon landing in Arizona, Second Lady Usha Vance was seen gently holding Erika Kirk’s hand, offering quiet support as the two stepped off the plane together.

A funeral for the prominent conservative activist is planned for next week, which President Donald Trump said he will attend. He added that he has spoken with Kirk’s wife, Erika, and said she is ‘devastated, absolutely devastated.’