US MLK's family fears records set for release will contain FBI "smears" - The brewing controversy pits Trump's determination to release documents the government has kept secret for more than a half-century against the family's lingering pain over how J. Edgar Hoover's FBI spied on King and tried to intimidate and humiliate him.

The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. gives a speech outside the UN on April 15, 1967, in New York City.
Photo: Santi Visalli/Getty Images

The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s family is concerned that President Trump's order to release records about his assassination could revive the FBI's attempts to discredit him — efforts that sought to exploit his indiscretions and undermine his legacy, sources close to his relatives tell Axios.

• The family requested a sneak preview of the records prior to their release. Trump declined, a White House official said, but not out of animus toward the family.

Why it matters: The brewing controversy pits Trump's determination to release documents the government has kept secret for more than a half-century against the family's lingering pain over how J. Edgar Hoover's FBI spied on King and tried to intimidate and humiliate him.

• Last month, Trump ordered the release of all records the U.S. government still holds about King's assassination in 1968, as well as the assassinations of President Kennedy (1963) and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy (196.
• The FBI has released documents about King's private life previously, but the new disclosure could include more documents detailing alleged embarrassing interactions in hotel rooms, private homes and even King's house,

"We know J. Edgar Hoover tried to destroy Dr. King's legacy, and the family doesn't want that effort to prevail," a King family friend told Axios.

• "Family members wanted an advanced viewing" of the documents, "and [Trump] said no," the White House official said, explaining that the president believes "these records don't belong to them. These are the public's records."
• The president's abiding interest is disclosure about what the government knew about the assassinations, not salacious details about the leaders' sex lives, the official said, adding that the King family's concerns had been relayed to the White House.

• "Everything will be revealed," Trump said last month after he announced his order to disclose information about the three 1960s assassinations that shaped a turbulent decade in American society and politics.

Zoom in: King's assassination at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis has long fueled conspiracy theories about potential government involvement, especially because of the FBI's hostility toward him.

• In 1969, James Earl Ray, a career criminal, pleaded guilty to shooting King but later recanted his confession, saying he was part of a larger conspiracy.
• Allegations of government complicity have persisted for decades, with civil rights leaders, investigative authors and Ray's attorneys citing the FBI, Memphis police, and Missouri State Penitentiary — from which Ray escaped a year before the killing — as potential conspirators.

Between the lines: The promise of complete disclosure alarmed the King family, who were hurt in 2019 by the release of FBI files that alleged sordid details about King's sex life, the family friend said.

• "The assassination of our father is a deeply personal family loss that we have endured over the last 56 years. We hope to be provided the opportunity to review the files as a family prior to its public release," the family said in an Instagram post Jan. 24, the day after Trump's order.
• "There are deep concerns" within the family, said a second source who has corresponded with one of King's two surviving adult children.
• "They know the right wing wants to smear Dr. King, and one way to do it is by putting these smears in the public under the guise of transparency. If there are assassination records, release those. But smears are not assassination records."

The big picture: Trump's push to release the assassination records reflect his longtime suspicion of the FBI. He stewed when the FBI investigated him, and has associated the bureau with what many conservatives see as a "Deep State" bureaucracy that has manipulated the government.

• So the King family and Trump share a common antagonist: the FBI.

King's pursuit of civil rights through nonviolence is his enduring legacy. But as his work unfolded in the 1960s, Hoover and others in the U.S. government sought to prevent the rise of what they feared would be a Black "messiah" who could unify African Americans.

• Congress formally recognized King's iconic status by approving a federal holiday in his honor more than 15 years after he was killed in Memphis.
• In the following decades, his legacy drew bipartisan admiration. More recently, however, far-right commentators such as Charlie Kirk, a Trump ally, began criticizing King.

Trump hasn't followed suit, but such criticism coincides with an increasing willingness among Republicans to attack affirmative action, diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs, and other initiatives designed to ensure fairness for historically disadvantaged groups.

• Trump has banned DEI programs in the U.S. government. He signed a proclamation declaring February as Black History Month — but his DEI ban led federal agencies to cancel activities celebrating it.

Flashback: FBI documents released through the years have shown how King's success as a civil rights organizer was rattling the bureau in 1963.

• "We must mark [King] now ... as the most dangerous Negro of the future in this Nation from the standpoint of communism, the Negro and national security," William Sullivan, then the FBI's director of intelligence, wrote in a memo two days after King delivered his famous "I Have a Dream" speech.
• As attorney general, Robert Kennedy approved Hoover's request in 1963 to wiretap King amid concerns that King was associating with communists.

During its surveillance of King, the FBI stumbled upon recordings, from the bugged home of his lawyer Clarence Jones, that indicated King was involved in an extramarital affair, according to the 2020 documentary "MLK/FBI."

• That led the FBI to expand its surveillance to include bugging King's home and hotel rooms. FBI agents reported that King was involved in several sexual liaisons, according to "MLK/FBI" and documents in the National Archives.
• In November 1964, the FBI anonymously sent a package to King at his home with a copy of an electronic surveillance tape that included personal information and a note suggesting that he kill himself, documents in the National Archives show.

FBI files accessible in the Archives suggest the bureau has tape recordings or photos of King's private activities that have never been released.

• A federal judge in 1977 ordered most recordings and reports on King's private life sealed until 2027. Under Trump's order, the documents would be released two years early, by March 9.

Sam Pollard, director of "MLK/FBI," tells Axios that there initially will be attention on "salacious stuff" when the records on King are released.

• But Pollard said the release also is likely to include tapes that will give scholars insight on conversations King had with Jesse Jackson and other associates on their strategies and views on their civil rights movement.
• "I don't think, personally, it's gonna hurt his reputation," said Pollard, who received a "cease and desist" order from King's family when he was working on his film but later reached an agreement with the family.

What we're watching: Under Trump's order, the government's long-withheld documents on former President Kennedy's assassination are supposed to be released imminently.

• The records regarding Robert Kennedy's assassination are supposed to be released after King's records, sometime after March 9.

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[Chilson]

God forbid your FED collaborating shitbag of an ancestor gets outed as the collaborating shitbag he always was.

 

[Grundlejungle]

They're parade his corpse around like it a fuckin cadaver synod.
This begs the question: 50 years from now is George Floyd's grand whatever gonna still be grifting off of his residency in dead nigger storage?

 

[TowinKarz]

Last 50 years - "The Guvment done killt him! Release dem documents!"

Last 50 minutes - "Aw Sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeit, not like that"

 

[Lone MacReady II]

Nigger kang junior was literally doing Floydian shit. America is a Banana Republic and the Roof Korean meme is true.

hey look, it's Diddy! Where's his BOOM BOX!?

 

[God of Nothing]

At the end of the day, MLK was just a nigger with a faggot nigger son.

 

[Drag-on Knight 91873]

At this point, it doesn't matter what MLK's reputation is. The mythology of him will persist because that one speech is more important than the rest of his life.

They're parade his corpse around like it a fuckin cadaver synod.
This begs the question: 50 years from now is George Floyd's grand whatever gonna still be grifting off of his residency in dead nigger storage?

The good news is Saint Fentanyl of Floyd is remembered as the ugly nigger that triggered BLM chimpouts and thus Black people's biggest blunder.

 

[Tasty Tatty]

They're only worried because if his legacy is tainted, they risk to lose money.

 

[Soycast Guy]

MLK was a dirty commie. I laugh when naive conservative boomers think he was actually some great man.

 

[Blewberry Nausea]

”The FBI is a tool of the deep state and can only be trusted to gaslight about any agitators who resist oppression!”
”Unless it’s about niggers though, then their reports are totally legit and I support their investigative excellence!”

The duality of A&N.

 

[World Famous Quasi Payer]

At this point, it doesn't matter what MLK's reputation is. The mythology of him will persist because that one speech is more important than the rest of his life.

The more people that studied the man, the less they will care about his "message". I've even redpilled some of my family members on King by pointing out he didn't believe in the resurrection of Christ. "I have a dream" doesn't work decades after affirmative action, and DEI fucking over people. In 50 years, this nigger will be mocked as the worthless nigger tool of communist jews he was.

 

[Necrosan]

They're parade his corpse around like it a fuckin cadaver synod.
This begs the question: 50 years from now is George Floyd's grand whatever gonna still be grifting off of his residency in dead nigger storage?

I'm pretty sure white people think about George Droyd more often than blacks do.

 

[Stoneheart]

This is about him being a sexpest and not him being a dirty commie.

Also he deserved to be shot for being both.

 

[pwnest injun]

Smears, like recordings and pictures and paper trails and contemporaneous interviews...

 

[Dog-O-Tron 5000v5.0]

All I care about is the JFK records. The rest is just gravy.

Are they coming out first, or is Trump doing the Showman thing and releasing them after MLK and RFK?

 

[Would]

”The FBI is a tool of the deep state and can only be trusted to gaslight about any agitators who resist oppression!”
”Unless it’s about niggers though, then their reports are totally legit and I support their investigative excellence!”

The duality of A&N.

I don't like niggers or glowniggers, but I just wanna laugh at nog royalty a little bit; is that so bad?

 

[KiwiFuzz2]

I'm tired of how he's held up as a modern saint and I would enjoy seeing him knocked down a peg or three.

Is that so wrong?

 

[Blewberry Nausea]

I don't like niggers or glowniggers, but I just wanna laugh at nog royalty a little bit; is that so bad?

I'm tired of how he's held up as a modern saint and I would enjoy seeing him knocked down a peg or three.

Is that so wrong?

Both of you say 15 “Hail MLK Jr”’s and no dessert.

 

[TooManyKittens]

Something something heros made up pedestals.

Also who gives a shit? Us evil whites have been told is raycist to quote king or agree with king on anything and really is anyone shocked we've come around to fine we can't get along and we shouldn't try. (See Malcom X more than King for this. Nevermind his supposed regret at the end. I now agree!)

So who cares what gets sqid about king? We've said for a decade his race take was outdated and wrong. So what if he's also a cheating, commie lying grifter? (He was)

 

[Strix454]

His "I have a dream speech" was ghostwritten for him as was his book "letters from a birmingham jail". The more I looked into him over the years, the more depressing everything seemed. He was this empty guy kind of cast as "leader" for the cameras and was turned into a somebody through media attention.
If he had lived longer, he would have degenerated into the sort of ridiculous clown the Jesse Jackson later became.