Trump signs executive orders to declassify JFK, RFK, and MLK files

President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday at the White House to declassify government records related to the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Senator Robert F. Kennedy, and the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.

The order aims to address long-standing questions and theories surrounding the killings, which occurred over 50 years ago. Official investigations concluded that lone gunmen were responsible for all three assassinations, but persistent conspiracy theories have challenged these findings. The prolonged classification of related records has fueled speculation and mistrust.

“This is a big one,” Trump remarked in the Oval Office as he signed the order. “A lot of people have been waiting for this for decades, and now everything will be revealed.”

The executive order directs the director of national intelligence and the attorney general to work with the assistant to the president for national security affairs and Trump’s legal counsel. Within 15 days, they must present a plan for the "full and complete release" of records related to President Kennedy's assassination. The same team is tasked with reviewing records concerning the assassinations of Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. and submitting a similar plan for their release.

“More than 50 years after these tragic events, the federal government has yet to disclose all its records,” the order states. “The families and the American public deserve transparency and truth. It is in the national interest to finally release all related records without further delay.”

The 1992 President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act required all documents related to JFK's assassination to be made public by October 26, 2017, unless the president deemed continued withholding necessary to protect national security. Trump, during his first term in 2017 and 2018, authorized delays in releasing some documents, as did former President Joe Biden later. Trump revealed in a Fox News interview on Wednesday that then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, a former CIA director, had urged him not to release certain Kennedy-related records during his presidency.

In Thursday’s order, Trump stated, “I have determined that withholding information from records related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy is no longer consistent with the public interest. The release of these records is long overdue.” He added, “Although Congress has not mandated the release of records regarding the assassinations of Senator Robert F. Kennedy and Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., I believe making these records public is also in the national interest.”

President Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963, while riding in a motorcade in Dallas, Texas. His younger brother, Senator Robert F. Kennedy, was fatally shot on June 5, 1968, in a Los Angeles hotel shortly after winning California’s Democratic presidential primary. Civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated two months earlier, on April 4, 1968, while standing on the balcony of a motel in Memphis, Tennessee.

Trump has also nominated Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the late senator’s son, to serve as the secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.