Latest news with #GeorgeJoannides
Daily Mail
a day ago
- Politics
- Daily Mail
New federal secrets exposed as Republican unravels Lee Harvey Oswald's hidden ties to CIA
New details have emerged about the man who is assumed to have killed former President John F. Kennedy, Lee Harvey Oswald, and his connections to the CIA. Republican Florida Congresswoman Anna Paulina Luna wrote on X Monday that the task force she leads on declassifying Kennedy assassination documents has learned that the CIA has 'been lying for 62 years' about his killing. Luna also noted that the release of the ex-CIA agent George Joannides' personnel file 'forever changes the game on the facts around the JFK assassination.' The newly released files reveal that the CIA was aware of Lee Harvey Oswald and his communist activism in support of former Cuban dictator Fidel Castro. Former agent Joannides, whose job was to manage the anti-Castro group DRE, along with interfering with pro-Castro groups, was aware of Oswald three months before he killed JFK, she says. The agency had for decades denied knowing about Oswald's pro-Cuba advocacy, as well as any involvement. Joannides, who was previously only known by the codename or alias 'Howard' used a false identities that were not even listed in agency records, suggesting that his work was 'off the books.' The CIA is supposed to focus its efforts on foreign intelligence, and not spy on U.S. citizens on American soil. The new findings about the CIA's ties to JFK's assassin comes at a time when Trump's MAGA supporters are clamoring for the release of the Epstein Files - a trove of documents into convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. Attorney General Pam Bondi last week was forced to retract her statement that the Epstein files were 'sitting on my desk' and instead told the American people that there was, in fact, no 'client list'. The DOJ released a video showing the outside of Epstein's cell at the Manhattan jail where he allegedly hanged himself. But Trump's MAGA base is still fuming that the Epstein Files have not been entirely released to the public. Last year on the campaign trail, Trump promised numerous times to release the Epstein files and the JFK files. An FBI website on the JFK investigation noted that 'after conducting some 25,000 interviews and running down tens of thousands of investigative leads, the FBI found that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone.' Back in April, witnesses testified before Congress that three deceased CIA agents were 'complicit' in the assassination of former President John F. Kennedy. Luna led a first task force hearing into the JFK files in April. The panel of witnesses included documentary maker Oliver Stone and authors Jefferson Morley and James DiEugenio, who have written books on JFK's murder. Morley, a liberal former Washington Post reporter and longtime Kennedy assassination author, opened his testimony by alleging three CIA agents were involved in the young president's untimely death. Documents unveiled under Trump's declassification efforts helped uncover that some of the CIA agents' testimony to Congress was false, which is a crime, Morley testified. The recent batch of files stunningly reveals that longtime head of CIA counterintelligence James Angleton lied to a Congress during their investigating the JFK assassination in 1978. Angleton's allegedly false testimony is in addition to other false statements given by former CIA Director Richard Helms and officer George Joannides, the author said, noting the pattern is 'incriminating.' 'We know now that Richard Helms, James Angleton and George Joannides were responsible for or complicit in the death of the President, either by criminal negligence or covert action,' Morley told the lawmakers. 'One false statement might be incompetence. A second false statement might be 'CYA' (cover your a**) for the first false statement, but three false statements by top CIA officers about Kennedy's accused killer. That is a pattern. It's a pattern of misconduct. It's a pattern of malfeasance.' Morley suggested the CIA release Joannides' personnel file and ask for the spy agency to provide a statement on why its agents lied to Congress. Joannides notably ran a program based out of Miami that involved communicating with Cubans about operations regarding Fidel Castro. Some of the agents working this case were in contact with Lee Harvey Oswald before the murder. Moreley said in April that Joannides also lied to lawmakers investigating JFK's murder in 1978, saying at the time he did not know who oversaw the program with the Cubans, despite being the very man overseeing the operation. Another witness, Stone, who was behind the Oscar-nominated movie 'JFK,' called for a new investigation into JFK's murder altogether. 'I ask the committee to reopen what the Warren Commission failed miserably to complete,' he shared. 'I ask you in good faith, outside all political considerations, to reinvestigate the assassination of President Kennedy from the scene of the crime to the courtroom.' The director also mentioned a joke Angleton told near his death calling Helms and another former CIA Director Allan Dulles 'grand masters' that 'you had to believe would deservedly end up in Hell.' Morley testified that Angleton had a file containing information on Oswald on his desk at the CIA one week before the JFK murder. The author noted that the FBI file on JFK's shooter was checked out by the CIA chief's liaison officer on November 14 and 15, 1963, just days before the shooting. But Morley said the CIA officers did not directly kill the president. 'I'm saying that they were engaged in covert activities related to Lee Harvey Oswald that have never been disclosed, and that's the imperative for the task force to obtain those records of that secret operation,' he clarified. Republican lawmakers were shocked with the testimony. 'Three top CIA officials lied to JFK assassination investigators,' Rep. Eric Burleson, R-Mo., said in a statment after the hearing, calling it 'one of the most significant revelations to come out of this.' Tennessee Republican Rep. Tim Burchett said after: 'This thing was a cover-up from the start.' He also lamented how answers about JFK's death may never be known since so many of the main people involved are long dead. Democrats were less moved with the testimony.
The Independent
a day ago
- Politics
- The Independent
New documents unearth what CIA knew about Lee Harvey Oswald
Newly released CIA documents reveal that Lee Harvey Oswald was on the agency's radar months before the assassination of John F Kennedy. The files disclose that a CIA surveillance officer, George Joannides, ran a group that had contact with Oswald in August 1963, a fact the agency had long denied. Joannides, operating under the alias "Howard Mark Gebler," directed covert operations to infiltrate anti-communist Cuban student groups and disseminate anti-Castro propaganda. The CIA repeatedly denied the existence of an agent named 'Howard' to investigators in 1964 and 1978, and again in 1998, despite honouring Joannides in 1981. This disclosure, unearthed by the House Oversight Committee, undermines the CIA 's previous claims and lends weight to theories of a broader cover-up, though it does not provide new details on the shooting itself.
The Independent
a day ago
- Politics
- The Independent
CIA has spent decades saying it knew little of Oswald before he killed JFK. New docs show that isn't true
The CIA has released bombshell new documents that reveal Lee Harvey Oswald was on their radar months before he assassinated former President John F. Kennedy. For the first time since JFK 's 1963 assassination, newly released files reveal that a surveillance officer ran a group that had contact with Oswald before the killing – something the agency had long denied. The disclosure was buried in a batch of 40 documents, which were unearthed by the House Oversight Committee 's 'federal secrets' task force earlier this month. It's the latest revelation that undermines the CIA's longstanding claims and lends new weight to theories of a broader cover-up. The release confirmed that CIA officer George Joannides had led U.S. efforts to infiltrate anti-communist Cuban student groups opposed to Fidel Castro in the months before JFK was shot dead riding in a motorcade through Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas, in November 1963. Joannides, who directed 'all aspects of political action and psychological warfare' at the CIA's Miami branch, ran a covert operation to disseminate anti-Castro propaganda and disrupt pro-Castro groups. It included funding and directing the Cuban student group, commonly referred to as DRE. Members of the group reportedly clashed with Oswald, who publicly promoted pro-Castro policy for the U.S., about three months before JFK's assassination in August 1963. A DRE member later claimed that Oswald approached the group with an offer of support, possibly intending to double-cross his own organization, the Fair Play for Cuba Committee. A CIA memo from January 1963 revealed Joannides was directed to use an alias and a fake driver's license bearing the name 'Howard Mark Gebler.' The DRE members in Miami used the name Howard for the CIA officer they kept updated on their activities. But the CIA told investigators in 1964 and again in 1978 that no such person existed. In 1998, the agency stated that it had no records of anyone named Howard and suggested the name might have been 'nothing more than a routing indicator.' Despite concealing his involvement, the CIA honored Joannides in 1981 with the Career Intelligence Medal. Investigators later testified that Joannides withheld critical information about his role in 1963, effectively stonewalling their efforts. 'This confirms much of what the public already speculated: that the CIA was lying to the American people, and that there was a cover-up,' said Anna Paulina Luna, overseeing the House committee examining the newly released JFK document, in an email to the Washington Post. The newly released documents don't reveal any additional details on JFK's shooting or settle the controversy over whether Oswald acted alone. In March, the Trump administration released thousands of classified documents related to the JFK assassination. On his third day in office, Trump ordered a 'full and complete release of all John F. Kennedy assassination records,' with researchers anticipating some 3,500 documents that had never been shared with the public. While experts noted that it was an 'encouraging start,' they said that the release didn't include two-thirds of the promised files, any of the 500 IRS records, or the recently discovered FBI files.
