WASHINGTON – U.S. President Donald Trump has announced he will release classified files relating to his predecessor John F. Kennedy, “subject to the receipt of further information”.
In a tweet Saturday afternoon, the POTUS said: “Subject to the receipt of further information, I will be allowing, as President, the long blocked and classified JFK FILES to be opened.
Subject to the receipt of further information, I will be allowing, as President, the long blocked and classified JFK FILES to be opened.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 21, 2017
The President is the only person in government with the authority to block the documents’ publication.
Kennedy was assassinated on 22 November 1963 in Dallas, Texas. The alleged assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, was convicted of his murder, with the Warren Commission appointed by Kennedy’s successor, Lyndon Johnson, finding he acted alone.
Oswald was shot dead by gunman Jack Ruby before he could be tried.
The United States National Archives must release the remaining files to the public by Thursday 26 October unless Trump moves to prevent it happening.
The decision was made in 1992 to publish all remaining files within 25 years after the film JFK revived interest in conspiracy theories of a cover-up by the government.
A 2013 poll of Americans by Gallup found that 61 per cent of the population believed other people were involved in the plot to kill the President other than Oswald, although that was the lowest in almost 50 years.
