logo
Trump's CIA releases 1,500 pages of never-seen-before RFK files including chilling handwritten notes from killer

Trump's CIA releases 1,500 pages of never-seen-before RFK files including chilling handwritten notes from killer

Daily Mail​12-06-2025
The CIA released over 1,500 pages Thursday of new previously unseen documents surrounding the 1968 assassination of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, which included handwritten notes from the convicted killer.
The new documents include a heavily redacted psychological profile of Sirhan Sirhan, noting that the man convicted of killing Kennedy had 'high intellectual potential' which was 'not properly utilized,' but conceded he had 'no specialized training in any area.'
Kennedy was shot and killed after the Democratic presidential primary in California in June 1968, just four-and-a-half years after his brother President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas.
Sirhan, a Palestinian with Jordanian citizenship, claimed he murdered RFK because of his support for Israel.
A personality assessment of Sirhan was also included in the release.
'Obviously, we cannot see him as part of a conspiracy,' the assessment read, but said it was possible 'he could be a tool of a conspiracy' even though 'the odds against him being successful were tremendous.'
'It is very unlikely however that he could have effectively acted under precise instructions,' the memo read.
'Today's release delivers on President Trump's commitment to maximum transparency, enabling the CIA to shine light on information that serves the public interest,' CIA Director John Ratcliffe said in a statement. 'I am proud to share our work on this incredibly important topic with the American people.'
The assessment describes Sirhan as an 'impulsive assassin' rather than a 'calculating assassin.'
It included a copy of Sirhan's handwritten notes in which he raged against Kennedy.
'Kennedy must fall. Kennedy must fall. Please pay to the order of Sirhan Sirhan,' reads the note, decrying the 'second group of American Traitors who must be disposed of.'
'We believe that Robert F. Kennedy must be sacrificed for the cause of the poor exploited people,' the notes continued.
The documents also revealed that Kennedy met with the CIA after he toured the Soviet Union as a young Senate staffer in 1955 as a voluntary informant.
Kennedy delivered significant detail of his trips to the the USSR, visiting locations highlighting the court system, manufacturing facilities, a mosque, collective farms, a music festival, and a union school.
'The records reveal for the first time that Senator Kennedy shared his experiences traveling to the former Soviet Union with CIA, reflecting his patriotic commitment to serving his country,' the CIA said in a statement.
DNI Secretary Tulsi Gabbard and Central Intelligence Agency Director John Ratcliffe testify at a congressional hearing
Other files show the FBI and CIA's concerns that they would be accused of assassinating Sen. Kennedy as part of an ongoing 'political murder conspiracy' circulating in the public.
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr, thanked the Trump administration for revealing more documents about his father's death.
'Lifting the veil on the RFK papers is a necessary step toward restoring trust in American government,' he said. 'I commend President Trump for his courage and his commitment to transparency. I'm grateful also to Tulsi Gabbard and John Ratcliffe for their dogged efforts to root out and declassify these documents.'
Gabbard has focused intently on releasing documents related to Senator Kennedy's death, revealing in April that the documents, 'really support the questions that Secretary Kennedy has been asking for decades about who really killed his father.'
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Starmer must take a strong line with Trump to relieve the suffering in Gaza
Starmer must take a strong line with Trump to relieve the suffering in Gaza

The Independent

time16 minutes ago

  • The Independent

Starmer must take a strong line with Trump to relieve the suffering in Gaza

The phrase 'walking a diplomatic tightrope' is overused by the media, but it is an accurate description of Sir Keir Starmer's task when he meets Donald Trump on Monday for talks at the US president's Turnberry golf course in Scotland. According to Downing Street sources, the prime minister will discuss what more can be done to secure a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, to 'bring an end to the unspeakable suffering and starvation in Gaza', and to hasten the release of the remaining Israeli hostages. Sir Keir is under growing pressure from Labour backbenchers, and several members of his cabinet, to go further by joining France's Emmanuel Macron in formally recognising Palestinian statehood. But if the prime minister did so, it would weaken his hand with Mr Trump, the only foreign leader with meaningful influence over Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister. So Gaza poses a big test for Sir Keir's quietly effective strategy of not challenging or criticising the US president in public. We have to take it on trust that he will argue strongly behind closed doors for the US to restart the peace talks it led in Qatar before it pulled out, blaming Hamas for the lack of progress. Indeed, President Trump should revive plans for a 60-day ceasefire, the release of some hostages, and – crucially – an increase in aid supplies, which are desperately needed to prevent more deaths from starvation. Such an approach by Sir Keir will not be enough for the 221 MPs, including a third of Labour backbenchers, who have signed a letter calling for the immediate recognition of Palestine. Or, indeed, for much of the British public. It is not surprising, given the harrowing pictures of emaciated children in TV news bulletins, that opinion in the UK is turning against Israel, which rightly enjoyed the goodwill of many after the horrific 7 October attacks. According to More in Common, 29 per cent of people now sympathise more with the Palestinians – up by 11 percentage points since November 2023 – while 27 per cent sympathise with neither side, 16 per cent with both sides equally, and 15 per cent with Israel. Some 48 per cent believe Israel's response to the conflict has been disproportionate, and only 28 per cent think it proportionate. Amid mounting outrage, Israel has announced a limited 'tactical pause' in its military operation in three areas of Gaza to allow in more humanitarian relief. The easing of restrictions is welcome, if long overdue, but it must be more than a cynical temporary move. It is no substitute for a ceasefire leading to negotiations on a long-term peace settlement. Nor will the airdrops planned by the UK and Jordan be more than a sticking plaster; they are ineffective compared with relief delivered by lorries, and sometimes even dangerous. Sir Keir's reluctance to recognise Palestine may prove to have been a holding line. If countries such as Germany, Canada and Australia change their minds and back France, he may shift. The SNP plans to force a vote on the issue when the Commons returns from its summer recess in September, which would expose Labour divisions. That month, the Labour conference will be problematic for its leader if he doesn't change tack, while the UN general assembly will discuss France's move. Yet for now, The Independent believes the prime minister is right to maximise his influence with President Trump, and to keep the recognition of Palestine as a card to play in talks on a permanent peace that must include a two-state solution to the Israel-Hamas conflict. Recognising Palestine now would not in itself change the terrible conditions on the ground in Gaza, as Bob Geldof, the Live Aid organiser, told Sky News on Sunday. He said it should have been done 'ages ago', but that the demands of Labour MPs amount to a distraction that 'is not going to make any material difference'. Sir Keir's quiet diplomacy is a better response to the crisis in Gaza than the tone-deafness of Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader. Interviewed on Sky, she backed calls for a ceasefire but said: 'What I see when I see Israel is a country that's trying to defend itself.' She declared that the pictures of starving children had not affected her support for Israel, insisting that it is allowing in relief supplies – a view that is hotly disputed by the United Nations and aid agencies. So far, Sir Keir has confounded critics who warned that he would not be able to have it both ways and maintain good relations with the US and the EU. He has secured trade deals with both. The emergency in Gaza now poses a big test for the prime minister's strong record on foreign affairs in the past year, which regrettably has not been matched on the domestic front. Sir Keir's understandable desire to hug Mr Trump close should not lead him to pull his punches over the gruesome tragedy unfolding in Gaza.

Jay Leno blasts late-night comedy hosts over divisive content as Colbert gets the boot from CBS
Jay Leno blasts late-night comedy hosts over divisive content as Colbert gets the boot from CBS

Daily Mail​

time17 minutes ago

  • Daily Mail​

Jay Leno blasts late-night comedy hosts over divisive content as Colbert gets the boot from CBS

Jay Leno is taking aim at modern late-night comedy shows, claiming the hosts are isolating half their viewers in an interview released just days after Stephen Colbert got the boot from CBS. The former Tonight Show host, 75, reflected on the shift in late-night culture during a sit-down interview with Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation president David Trulio. The candid conversation was taped two weeks ago but was recently shared and quickly circulated online. They spoke openly about comedy, politics and what's changed in the late-night world. Trulio began by mentioning to Leno that his jokes had a reputation of being equally balanced in his time on air. 'I read that there was an analysis done of your work on 'The Tonight Show' for the 22 years and that your jokes were roughly equally balanced between going after Republicans and taking aim at Democrats. Did you have a strategy?' Trulio asked. 'I got hate letters saying, 'You and your Republican friends,' and another saying, 'I hope you and your Democratic buddies are happy' - over the same joke,' Leno said. 'That's how you get a whole audience. Now you have to be content with half the audience, because you have to give your opinion.' 'Rodney Dangerfield and I were friends,' Continued Leno. 'I knew Rodney 40 years and I have no idea if he was a Democrat or Republican. We never discussed politics, we just discussed jokes.' 'I like to think that people come to a comedy show to get away from the pressures of life. I love political humor - don't get me wrong. But people wind up cozying too much to one side or the other.' 'Funny is funny,' Leno said. 'It's funny when someone who's not….when you make fun of their side and they laugh at it, you know, that's kind of what I do.' 'I just find getting out - I don't think anybody wants to hear a lecture,' he continued. 'When I was with Rodney, it was always in the economy of words - get to the joke as quickly as possible.' He criticized comedians who inject their political opinions into every monologue and said he preferred making the whole audience laugh rather than pushing an agenda. 'I don't think anybody wants to hear a lecture … Why shoot for just half an audience? Why not try to get the whole? I like to bring people into the big picture,' he said. 'I don't understand why you would alienate one particular group, you know, or just don't do it at all. I'm not saying you have to throw your support or whatever, but just do what's funny.' His comments come in the wake of Colbert's dramatic departure from The Late Show. A media frenzy engulfed The Late Show after Colbert publicly slammed the CBS show's parent corporation, Paramount Global, for settling a defamation lawsuit with Trump for $16 million, calling it a 'big, fat, bribe,' in his opening monologue. Just days after the searing call-out, Colbert told his studio audience that the network was ending The Late Show in May 2026. Speculation has loomed over why the show was canceled, with A-listers and fellow talk-show hosts coming to the comedian's defense. Colbert won an Emmy for his work on The Colbert Report, a satirical show that ran on Comedy Central from 2005 to 2014. After he replaced David Letterman on The Late Show, the program was nominated for the most Outstanding Talk Series at the Emmys from 2017 to 2022. Meanwhile, other late-night legends have rallied behind Colbert in the wake of his show's cancellation. Jimmy Fallon said: 'I don't like it. I don't like what's going on one bit. These are crazy times,' Fallon said, referencing how 'everybody [was] talking about' the decision. 'And many people are now threatening to boycott the network', he said, setting up another punchline. 'Yeah - CBS could lose millions of viewers, plus tens of hundreds watching on Paramount+.' David Letterman also backed his successor and suggested CBS canceled The Late Show because he was 'always shooting his mouth off' about Donald Trump. The 78-year-old late-night legend created The Late Show in 1993 after NBC denied him the chance to succeed Johnny Carson on The Tonight Show. In his first comment on the show's cancellation, Letterman noted that his show was more about political satire than his version of The Late Show but was still complimentary, calling the decision by CBS 'pure cowardice.' 'I think one day, if not today, the people at CBS who have manipulated and handled this, they're going to be embarrassed, because this is gutless,' he told former Late Show producers Barbara Gaines and Mary Barclay.

Jordan and UAE aid drops underway in Gaza during Israel's 'tactical pause'
Jordan and UAE aid drops underway in Gaza during Israel's 'tactical pause'

BBC News

time17 minutes ago

  • BBC News

Jordan and UAE aid drops underway in Gaza during Israel's 'tactical pause'

Jordan and the UAE have dropped aid into Gaza after Israel began a "tactical pause" in fighting to mitigate a worsening humanitarian military said its planes, working with the UAE, had delivered 25 tonnes of aid in three drops on Sunday. A lorry convoy also entered from Egypt and another is due from Jordan. Israel said on Sunday it would halt military operations for 10 hours a day in parts of Gaza and allow aid corridors, to "refute the false claim of intentional starvation".However, medics reported nine killed and 54 injured by Israeli fire near an aid convoy route in central Gaza. An airstrike also hit a residential block an hour after a pause came into effect on Saturday. Gaza air drops 'a grotesque distraction', aid agencies warn Local sources told the BBC that nine people were shot in the Netzarim Corridor along Salah al-Din Street in central Gaza, where many civilians had gathered in anticipation of incoming UN aid convoys. Victims were taken to al-Awda Hospital in Nuseirat, a medical official at the facility Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said its troops "fired warning shots" at a "gathering of suspects" approaching them. It said it was not aware of any BBC Verify geolocated an airstrike to Midhat Al-Wahidy Street in Al-Rimal district of western Gaza City - which Israel had designated an hour before as an area where operations would verification was based on witness reports and two geolocated videos published earlier on Sunday. The IDF said it had checked the coordinates and were not aware of a aid trucks arriving in the strip on Sunday were swarmed as desperate Palestinians tried to grab bags of flour from an aid truck near a food distribution point in Zikim, northern has come under intense international pressure over recent weeks to allow aid into the territory it controls, amid reports of mass starvation. The UN's World Food Programme says a third of the two million population of Gaza does not eat for several days at a time, and a quarter were "enduring famine-like conditions".More than 100 people have been reported by the Hamas-run health ministry to have died from malnutrition in recent days. Hundreds have meanwhile been killed by gunfire as they attempted to get food from the limited number of distribution points run by the Israeli and US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF). The UK's foreign secretary, David Lammy, said Israel's concessions over the weekend alone would not alleviate the suffering in Gaza."Whilst air drops will help to alleviate the worst of the suffering, land routes serve as the only viable and sustainable means of providing aid into Gaza," he said in a statement."These measures must be fully implemented and further barriers on aid removed. The world is watching."Volker Türk, the UN high commissioner for human rights, meanwhile called for more international pressure to end the war. Every day, he said, brought "more destruction, more killings, and the further dehumanisation of Palestinians".Donald Trump, the US president, said he would be sending more aid to Gaza but urged this was "an international problem - it's not a US problem". Residents of Gaza have cautiously welcomed reports of a temporary humanitarian pause allowing food and medicine to enter the besieged enclave. "Of course I feel a bit of hope again, but also worried that starvation would continue once the pause is over," Rasha Al-Sheikh Khalil, a mother of four in Gaza City, told the Saleh, a mother of six, said her family hadn't eaten "a single fresh fruit or vegetable in four months". "There's no chicken, no meat, no eggs. All we have are canned foods that are often expired and flour."Imad Kudaya, a local journalist in Gaza and from al-Mawasi, in the south of the Strip, said most of the air drop packages "have fallen in demilitarised places where if you go there you will put yourself in a very big risk"."Those place are evacuated and under Israeli control - so it is risky."Even as air drops and convoys headed into Gaza, Israel's prime minister promised his country would "continue to fight, we will continue to act until we achieve all of our war goals - until complete victory".During his visit to Ramon Air Force Base in the Negev Desert, Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel had always allowed aid into Gaza, and that the UN had unfairly blamed his government for the crisis."There are secure routes. There have always been, but today it's official. There will be no more excuses," he the new measures, Israel said it would suspend fighting in three populated areas of Gaza for 10 hours a day and open secure routes for aid IDF said it would open humanitarian corridors for aid convoys in Gaza to allow the UN and other organisations to deliver food and medicine to Palestinians across the strip. The routes would be in place from 06:00 to 23:00 local time (04:00 BST to 21:00 BST).The pause in military activity would take place in three areas - Al-Mawasi, Deir al-Balah and Gaza City - from 10:00 to 20:00 local time (08:00 BST to 18:00 BST) each day until further notice, the IDF apparent concessions followed its acceptance of a Jordanian and UAE plan, backed by the UK, to air drop aid into Gaza. Israel launched a war in Gaza in response to the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken than 59,000 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store