Previously classified JFK assassination files released
Historians are reviewing the freshly declassified documents on the JFK assassination, consisting of police reports and handwritten notes.
Fox – 10 Phoenix
Americans anticipating a huge release of documents on Tuesday night about the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy got what they were expecting, but experts say it will take time to sort out the importance of a huge information dump.
The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration says it released 63,400 pages across 2,182 PDF files, a stunning volume of information for historians and amateur sleuths to comb through.
Among the unanswered questions: How much previously unreleased information is contained in the documents? And how long will it take for historians to assess the flood of files?
President Donald Trump’s administration signaled the release would include a huge trove of unredacted records available to the public for the first time. So far, nothing in the documents has changed the long-held findings that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in assassinating Kennedy on Nov. 22, 1963 while the then-president rode in a motorcade in Dallas.
The release of the files comes after Trump signed a day one executive order in January aimed at fully releasing government documents related to the assassinations of Kennedy, his brother and presidential candidate Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, D-N.Y., and civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr.
Here’s what to know about the March 18 release:
What do the JFK files say?
While an initial review of the papers didn’t contain any shocking revelations, the documents do offer a window into the climate of fear at the time surrounding U.S. relations with the Soviet Union shortly after the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 nearly led to a nuclear war.
Many of the documents reflected the work by investigators to learn more about assassin Lee Harvey Oswald’s time in the Soviet Union and track his movements in the months leading up to Kennedy’s assassination in Dallas.
How to read the JFK files
The National Archives has set up a page dedicated to the March 18, 2025, release where you can search through thousands of files. You can find the page on the National Archives’ website.
Most of the files are scans of documents, and some are blurred or have become faint or difficult to read in the decades since Kennedy’s assassination.
Was big news expected in the JFK files release?
A lack of immediate bombshells doesn’t surprise some experts.
The the National Archives collected the documents from other agencies ‒ like the CIA ‒ years ago, according to James Johnston, author of “Murder, Inc.: The CIA under John F. Kennedy.”
“If it was going to embarrass the agency or tell a different story, they wouldn’t have turned them over to the National Archives in the first place,” Johnston said.
Fredrik Logevall, a Harvard history professor whose books include “JFK: Coming of Age in the American Century 1917-56,” said in an email the new documents may help historians better understand the circumstances around the assassination.
“It’s valuable to get all the documentation out, ideally in unredacted form. But I don’t expect dramatic new revelations that alters in some fundamental way our grasp of the event,” he said.
Will more JFK files be released?
There may be even more information coming, as estimates said a total of 80,000 pages were expected to be published after a review by Justice Department lawyers.
The National Archives’ release page suggests more may be released as well: “As the records continue to be digitized, they will be posted to this page.”
Contributing: Reuters