NewsNation’s Ross Coulthart will host a special report, “Declassified: The JFK Assassination,” this Saturday at 8p/7C. Find out how to watch at NewsNationNow.com.
WASHINGTON (NewsNation) — President Donald Trump said Friday that individuals will be able to make their own “determination” as to who killed former President John F. Kennedy.
“I don’t think there’s anything that’s earth-shattering,” said Trump. “But you’ll have to make that determination.”
Following up on Trump’s promise, the National Archives released thousands of documents related to Kennedy’s assassination.
Could take a while to know what new information was released with JFK files
Many of the documents are handwritten or blurred due to age and are difficult to search, so historians and journalists are still pouring through them to uncover new details, but here is what is known so far.
Exactly what information in the documents is new and what is old is difficult to determine.
The only way to clearly tell what information is new is to compare the documents to older versions previously released by the National Archives, a laborious process. The documents were also not classified or sorted in any way, so it could take days to determine what new information was actually released.
So far, there hasn’t been any “smoking gun” that would validate decadesold conspiracies about the assassination.
Personal information found in JFK files
Sensitive personal information, including Social Security numbers, was revealed in the newly unredacted documents.
Joseph diGenova, a former campaign lawyer for Trump, was among those whose personal information was disclosed. He said he is planning to sue the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration for violating privacy laws over concerns about identity theft.
Trump, speaking from the Oval Office on Friday, confirmed the release of Social Security numbers.
“We even released Social Security numbers,” he said. “I didn’t want anything deleted.”
NewsNation’s Steph Whiteside contributed to this report.