US President Donald Trump has directed federal officials to draft a plan to declassify documents related to three of the most infamous assassinations in American history: President John F. Kennedy, Senator Robert F. Kennedy, and civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.
“A lot of people have been waiting for this, for years, for
decades,” Trump announced Thursday from the Oval Office. “And everything will
be revealed.”
The executive order requires administration officials to
prepare a declassification strategy within 15 days. However, the move does not
guarantee the full release of the documents.
President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas in 1963
by Lee Harvey Oswald, a former Marine who defected to the Soviet Union before
returning to the United States.
While a government commission concluded that Oswald acted
alone, lingering doubts have fueled alternative theories, implicating figures
ranging from organized crime to intelligence agencies.
In 1968, Robert F. Kennedy was killed while campaigning for
president in California, just two months after Martin Luther King Jr. was
fatally shot in Memphis, Tennessee. Both murders have similarly inspired
decades of speculation about potential conspiracies.
Many documents related to these investigations have already
been made public, but thousands remain redacted or classified, particularly
those tied to the extensive investigation into JFK’s assassination.
Polls consistently show that most Americans doubt the
official narrative that Oswald acted alone. A 1992 law mandated the release of
all JFK-related files within 25 years, but successive administrations,
including Trump’s first term, withheld portions due to national security
concerns.
Trump’s new order declares that continued secrecy “is not
consistent with the public interest.”
Recent disclosures have added fresh details to the cases. In
2023, Paul Landis, a former Secret Service agent who was present at JFK’s
assassination, claimed he retrieved a bullet from the president’s limousine—a
revelation that complicates the “single bullet” theory.
Jefferson Morley, a journalist and expert on the JFK
assassination, welcomed Trump’s announcement but cautioned, “The details and
implementation are everything. This process is just beginning, and how it will
be carried out remains unclear.”
During Thursday’s signing ceremony, Trump handed the pen
used to sign the order to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the son of RFK and nephew of
JFK, who currently serves as Trump’s nominee for health secretary.
RFK Jr. has long challenged the official accounts of both
his father’s and uncle’s assassinations.
He has even questioned Sirhan Sirhan’s role in his father’s
killing, although other members of the Kennedy family reject such claims.
The King family, too, has questioned the narrative
surrounding MLK’s murder by James Earl Ray, with some alleging a broader
conspiracy.
While experts like Morley believe a full release of
documents could significantly enhance public understanding, they caution that
no “smoking gun” may emerge, as intelligence agencies are likely to resist full
transparency.
“This story is not over,” Morley remarked.
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