Former President Donald Trump pledged in an interview with The Messenger published Monday to release “the remaining portion” of classified files detailing the assassination of former President John F. Kennedy if he is elected to a second term.
Trump released roughly 2,800 records in 2017 about the 1963 assassination, but extended the retention of some of the documents, saying he had “no choice.” Trump set a new three-year deadline for the files’ release in 2018. President Joe Biden released more than 12,000 documents in 2021 and 2022.
Trump has vowed to release the rest of the JFK files should he win in 2024. “I released a lot, as you know. And I will release everything else,” Trump told The Messenger. “I will release the remaining portion very early in my term.”
EXCLUSIVE: Trump vows to release all of the JFK assassination files: ‘I will release everything else’ https://t.co/DtJynJqoK4 pic.twitter.com/XHPdha0Qs5
— The Messenger (@TheMessenger) May 15, 2023
He declined to say whether or not the files would “make the U.S. look terrible” or “scare” the public. (RELATED: Trump Vows To Release Classified JFK Files)
Files released by Trump and Biden revealed that the CIA was monitoring Kennedy assassin Lee Harvey Oswald when he was in Mexico City in the weeks before the killing. Oswald was planning to defect to Cuba, the documents showed. Others demonstrated that top government officials considered orchestrating a false flag attack on American or allied bases in order to provoke a war with the Soviet Union.
A longtime fan of alternative Kennedy assassination theories, Trump accused Texas Sen. Ted Cruz’s father Rafael of being an Oswald associate.
“His father was with Lee Harvey Oswald prior to Oswald’s being — you know, shot. I mean, the whole thing is ridiculous,” Trump told Fox News. “What is this, right prior to his being shot, and nobody even brings it up. They don’t even talk about that. That was reported, and nobody talks about it.”
“I mean, what was he doing — what was he doing with Lee Harvey Oswald shortly before the death? Before the shooting?”
The Cruz campaign called the accusation a “garbage story in a tabloid full of garbage.”