The Trump administration has declassified over 230,000 pages of documents related to the 1968 assassination of civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr., including FBI surveillance records previously sealed by court order since 1977.
The files, described as containing internal memos and previously unseen CIA material, were made public following a directive from President Trump, alongside similar orders concerning the Kennedy assassinations.
King’s children, Martin III and Bernice, condemned the move, urging the public to approach the documents with empathy and caution, warning that the files reflect a disturbing FBI campaign led by J. Edgar Hoover that violated their father’s dignity and privacy.
However, other relatives, like Alveda King, welcomed the release as a step toward truth.
Critics, including Al Sharpton, accused the administration of using the disclosure to deflect attention from controversies surrounding the handling of documents tied to Jeffrey Epstein.