California shooters did not pledge support for IS on social media: FBI

San Bernardino attack suspects Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik did not pledge support for the Islamic State (IS) group on social media as previously reported, FBI Director James Comey said on Wednesday. 

They had, however, expressed support for "jihad and martyrdom" in private communications as early as 2013, Comey was quoted by Reuters as saying.

There is no evidence the two were members of an IS cell, he added.

Comey's statement contradicts a previous statement by the assistant director of the FBI's Los Angeles field office, who said on 4 December that one of the suspects had posted a "pledge of allegience" to IS on Facebook.

CNN and other news sources have also reported that Malik posted a pledge in support of IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi on her Facebook profile.

Meanwhile, the White House said on Friday that President Barack Obama will travel to California on Friday to meet privately with families of the victims of the San Bernardino shooting.

The mass shooting on December 2 left 14 people dead and 21 wounded in what the FBI is investigating as a possible terrorist attack. 

Obama will stop in San Bernardino while en route to Honolulu for a two-week family vacation, according to his spokesman Josh Earnest on Wednesday. No public statement by the president is expected.

Most of those who died during a holiday office party on 2 December were working for the San Bernardino County public health authority. 

Both Farook, an American of Pakistani origin, and his Pakistani wife were inspired by "foreign terrorists," according to the FBI.