The F.B.I. director has come under withering attack in recent days, but with Republicans backing him, the proceedings fell into a familiar partisan groove that appeared to play to his strengths.
The attorney general also said she could investigate businesses that refused to print Charlie Kirk vigil posters as the Trump administration pushes to punish anyone who celebrated his killing.
Attorney General Pam Bondi later appeared to back away from a broad interpretation of her remarks on “hate speech,” which had raised free speech concerns.
The two agents’ accounts offer an inside view of a bureau buffeted by politics and upheaval, adding to the scrutiny of the F.B.I. director as he prepares to testify to Congress.
“We were always told that we would be taken care of and there would not be any retaliation for our assigned work,” Walter Giardina told his supervisors the day he was fired from his job as an F.B.I. agent, according to the 19-year bureau veteran.