During his testimony before a House Judiciary Committee this week, FBI Director Christopher Wray said the following that provided fodder for the "Trump didn't really get shot" conspiracy crowd:

Wray testified that he hadn't really noticed anything that would indicate President Biden was in decline but didn't want to concede that, yes, it was a bullet that hit Trump. Yep, we're in the best of hands.

That testimony was enough for the FBI to later issue this clarification: 

From the Associated Press:

Nearly two weeks after Donald Trump’s near assassination, the FBI confirmed Friday that it was indeed a bullet that struck the former president’s ear, moving to clear up conflicting accounts about what caused the former president’s injuries after a gunman opened fire at a Pennsylvania rally. 

“What struck former President Trump in the ear was a bullet, whether whole or fragmented into smaller pieces, fired from the deceased subject’s rifle,” the agency said in a statement. 

The one-sentence statement from the FBI marked the most definitive law enforcement account of Trump’s injuries and followed ambiguous comments earlier in the week from Director Christopher Wray that appeared to cast doubt on whether Trump had actually been hit by a bullet. 

But Wray's testimony served a purpose, and it's a troubling one. 

That's exactly what happened.

Narratives ebb and flow in very predictable ways.