Trump administration releases MLK assassination records despite the King family’s opposition to the records being made public.
National Archive records relating to the assassination of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. are being added to the agency’s web page on a rolling basis.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) said in a statement Monday that the release included more than 230,000 files relating to King’s assassination, including information connected to the man who was convicted of murdering him, James Earl Ray. appear on the website. Much of that content that is not redacted in those pages focuses on protests and public outbreaks in reaction to the slaying of the civil rights leader along with tapped telephone conversations, concealed devices planted in hotel suites, and steady streams of informant accounts meant to mar King’s character and undermine his legacy. They also underscore the FBI’s relentless surveillance of King, stretching from the late 1950s through the 1960s.
The official declassification reads, “… although no Act of Congress directs the release of information pertaining to the assassinations of Senator Robert F. Kennedy and the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., I have determined that the release of all records in the Federal Government’s possession pertaining to each of those assassinations is also in the public interest.”
Monday’s release includes the FBI records related to the investigation into the assassination of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. under the codename MURKIN.
Several civil rights leaders warned that select excerpts could be misused to sully King’s reputation or to resuscitate long-debunked conspiracy theories about his life.
“The documents include details about the FBI’s investigation into the assassination of MLK, discussion of potential leads, internal FBI memos detailing the progress of the case, information about James Earl Ray’s former cellmate who stated he discussed with Ray an alleged assassination plot, and more,” the ODNI statement said.
The King family has been united in their opposition to the release of the records, and have publicly questioned the FBI’s investigation, and some members have expressed doubt that Ray was the lone killer, stating their belief that he was setup by nefarious forces. In a Vanity fair article King says “… my brother Dexter, had visited James Earl Ray in prison and looked into his eyes to ask him if he had killed our father. Ray responded, “No.” Despite the official narrative that the FBI and its then director, J. Edgar Hoover, crafted about Ray’s role as the sole assassin, our family believes that Ray was not the assassin but a scapegoat used by a large and powerful network, one that included informants whom the FBI recruited from within my father’s camp.”
“While we she support transparency and historical accountability, we object to any attacks on our father’s legacy or attempts to weaponize it to spread falsehoods,” King’s children, Martin Luther King III and Dr. Bernice A. King, wrote in a statement.
“As we review these newly released files, we will assess whether they offer additional insights beyond the findings our family has already accepted,” they said.
King also said in an Instagram post, “Now do the Epstein files.”
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