The FBI has not fired anyone involved in drafting the memo that labeled “traditional Catholics” as potential domestic terrorists because their overstep was not “intentional,” FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress.

He said, however, that some employees in the Richmond office, where the memo originated, have been “admonished” and had notes placed in their personnel records, which he said could affect their future compensation.

He said that while he was “aghast” after seeing the memo, it doesn’t signal any deep anti-Catholic bias within the bureau’s ranks.

“A number of the individuals involved in writing that product in the Richmond office were themselves Catholic,” Mr. Wray told the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Mr. Wray also revealed that his bureau has been slammed with cases involving attacks on pro-life centers in the months since last year’s leak of a Supreme Court draft opinion overturning the Roe v. Wade abortion ruling.

“We’ve seen a huge uptick in violence against pro-life facilities,” he testified.

That seemed to surprise Democratic Sen. Laphonza Butler, an ardent pro-choice politician who used to run EMILY’s List and who’d prodded Mr. Wray to opine on threats to abortion clinics.

“Let me move to a different topic,” she said.

Mr. Wray was testifying to senators in an oversight hearing on his bureau and found himself facing tough questions on everything from politicization at the bureau to handling of data collection under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to whether terrorists are exploiting the southern border.

Republicans said the FBI risks losing the trust of Americans because of its behavior in recent years, including entwining itself in presidential politics with unsubstantiated investigations, encouraging social media censorship of some politics-related posts, and repeated abuses of the FBI’s access to FISA data.

The Richmond traditional Catholic memo has become a focal point for Republicans.

A new report by the House Judiciary Committee this week revealed the FBI interviewed a priest and a choir director as part of its investigative efforts.

The report also said the FBI used an undercover agent to develop its assessment of traditional Catholics, and proposed developing more sources “among the Catholic clergy” to try to spot extremist threats.

Mr. Wray said the memo has been disavowed, but he said an internal review of the incident found no “intentional” effort to target religious adherents.

He also said the priest and choir director interviews were a separate matter altogether, stemming not from any broad probe of Catholics but rather a specific investigation into one person who “was amassing Molotov cocktails and posting about killing people.”

“We don’t investigate people for the exercise of their constitutionally protected religious expression,” he said.

Mr. Wray didn’t directly address the Judiciary Committee’s allegations about attempts to use an undercover operative.

The Judiciary Committee report says the operative sought to use religious organizations for “tripwire and source development.”

• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.