This week’s much-anticipated (and promised) release of the unredacted files pertaining to the assassination of former President John F. Kennedy were released this week.
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard praised President Donald Trump for making good on his promise, saying that he is “ushering in a new era of maximum transparency.”
“President Trump is ushering in a new era of maximum transparency,” Gabbard wrote in a post on X this week.
“Today, per his direction, previously redacted JFK Assassination Files are being released to the public with no redactions. Promises made, promises kept.”
President Trump is ushering in a new era of maximum transparency. Today, per his direction, previously redacted JFK Assassination Files are being released to the public with no redactions. Promises made, promises kept. https://t.co/UnG1vkgxjX pic.twitter.com/XBbkQfz4Bx
— DNI Tulsi Gabbard (@DNIGabbard) March 18, 2025
The slew of now public documents can officially be accessed directly by the public at the National Archives website.
And while experts so far say that this latest release by the Trump administration does not answer all lingering questions about JFK’s assassination, it does shed light on four items that have been otherwise not discussed for years.
Here’s a breakdown of the major takeaways from the newly-released files:
More on Lee Harvey Oswald
The new documents shed shed some new light on the CIA’s strong surveillance of Lee Harvey Oswald.
Jefferson Morley, a former Washington Post reporter and editor of the JFK Facts blog, said of Oswald in the new files:
“He’s a subject of deep interest to the CIA” long before the assassination, and the extent of this has only become clear in the last few years.”
Morley called it “the most exciting news around JFK records since the 1990s”.
“Several very important documents have come into public view,” he said.
Experts can now conclude that the CIA was monitoring him at that time.
According to the Associated Press (AP), “There’s reason to believe he talked openly about killing Kennedy in Mexico City and that people overheard him say that.”
In a previously released April 1975 memo, the CIA downplayed what it knew about Oswald’s trip to Mexico City, the AP reported.
The CIA recorded three phone calls between Oswald and a guard at the Soviet embassy, it said, but Oswald only identified himself in one.
More details on intelligence
The new documents also shed light on Kennedy’s relationship with the CIA before his death and on intelligence-gathering techniques – giving a window into Cold War operations.
A newly unredacted memo reveals a more complete version of a note written by Kennedy aide Arthur Schlesinger at the time.
Critical of the CIA and its role in shaping foreign policy, the note shows the agency’s huge presence in US embassies, even in allied countries such as France.
In it, Schlesinger warns Kennedy about the agency’s influence on American foreign policy.
Though not directly related to the assassination, the memo details the rocky relationship between the president and intelligence agencies.
Old theories resurface
The new documents reveal new details about long-alleged plots against JFK – even though some of the supposed revelations have been public for years.
They include several viral posts about Gary Underhill – a World War II military intelligence agent.
Underhill reportedly claimed that a cabal of CIA agents was behind the assassination, a theory openly published in Ramparts, a left-wing magazine, in 1967.
Mr Underhill’s death in 1964 was ruled a suicide, but the magazine cast doubt on that as well.
Unredacted – but not completely?
Both President Trump in his first term and President Biden, as recently as 2023, released batches of documents related to JFK.
Ahead of the new release, Trump said that he asked his staff “not to redact anything” from them.
But according to the release, that may not be 100% true as the new documents still have some redactions.
However, experts were largely in agreement that the latest release was a step forward for transparency.
JFK Files journalist Morley said there are further documents in the National Archives yet to be released, and others held by the CIA and FBI that have not yet been accounted for.