Debunking Morley's Congressional Statement

On April 1, 2025, conspiracy researcher and author Jefferson Morley submitted a written statement to the House Task Force on Declasification of Federal Secrets headed by Florida Congresswoman Anna Paulina Luna. Morley's statement provided no new information but instead trotted out some timeworn myths that have been repeatedly debunked on this blog and elsewhere. And at the very least, Morley's claims have alternative explanations.

Morley claims a "fact pattern" demonstrates CIA culpability in the JFK murder. The "tipping point" for Morley was a newly released document about the HTLINGUAL mail opening program. But being a skeptic, I would say that what convinced Morley that the CIA was complicit in the JFK case was the Oliver Stone film JFK which he viewed in the nineties. Let's look at his statements to the Task Force.

Morley Claim: Richard Helms lied under oath to the Warren Commission when he said the CIA had only "minimal" knowledge of Oswald before JFK was killed.

The reality is the CIA certainly had some level of knowledge about LHO before the assassination. How one characterizes that knowledge is a matter of interpretation. But as reported here previously, Morley is mischaracterizing the Helms testimony.

Noted researcher Paul Hoch points out that Morley is taking Helms' remarks "badly out of context." In a discussion on a private email group, Hoch noted "It is quite clear from the context that Helms was referring to what the CIA knew at an early point, around the time of Oswald’s defection. It was not about what the CIA had at the time of the assassination." Hoch adds, "That conclusion is reinforced by two earlier events."

Hoch notes that Helms' testimony was on May 14, 1964. But over two months earlier, Helms had sent the Commission a copy of the “official dossier” on Oswald, which became CD 692. There were 30 documents, plus a sanitized memo covering October and November. "So it makes no sense" Hoch concludes, "to suggest that Helms intended to deceive the commission by referring to “minimal” pre-assassination information." Additionally, Hoch points out that "when Helms testified the Commission staff already knew a lot about the most sensitive late information which was not included in CD 692." This included the Coleman-Slawson-Willens visit to Mexico, on April 8-13.

Morley Claim: Three top CIA officers lied under oath about JFK’s assassination. In response to a direct request from HSCA investigator Dan Hardway, George Joannides denied knowing who ran the AMSPELL program in 1963 — when he himself had run it.

First, there is no documentation that officially states that Joannides (who did, in fact, run the DRE-AMSPELL program) was asked who ran the operation. We have Dan Hardway's claim and he is a reliable individual and good investigator. But he is biased toward conspiracy in the JFK matter and his memories from many years before could be influenced by this. He could be misremembering the situation.

But if Joannides did lie to Hardway, there is an alternative explanation. Joannides had no knowledge of the assassination or that any of his Miami agents were involved in any way. So, like Allen Dulles who did not disclose operations by the JFK administration to kill Castro, Joannides kept his CIA secrecy oath and withheld the information about the DRE and his role in that project. But he did so, not out of an effort to conceal guilty knowledge, but simply to keep the secrets of the agency.

Additionally, Morley claims that Joannides was one of three CIA men who lied under oath about the JFK murder. But when was Joannides questioned by Hardway or anyone about the DRE "under oath" as Morley maintains? To my knowledge, Joannides was never questioned by any government body under oath about the DRE or anything else.

By the way, while Morley is concerned about the CIA's alleged misrepresentation of information, he shows no indication that he is going to stop his own voluminous misrepresentations. For example, in his congressional statement, Morley says "[Joannides'] agents in New Orleans and Miami engaged in political action against Oswald’s pro-Castro activism, and generated propaganda about him both before and after Kennedy was killed." but Joannides had no "agents" in New Orleans. The individuals who interacted with Oswald in New Orleans, including Carlos Bringuier, were unpaid delegates of the DRE not CIA agents as Morley implies.

It is obvious that the congressional inquisitors were not well versed on the topic of Morley and Joannides. If they had been when Morley advised them to make the personnel file of Joannides avaiable to the public, they could have asked if any government investigator has ever seen the file and what was their recomendation? They would have learned that ARRB investigator Michelle Combs saw the file and said it was not relevant to the assassination.

Morley Claim: CIA Counterintelligence Chief James Angleton lied to the HSCA about mail surveillence of LHO.

First, understand that Morley has been promoting the idea that Angleton was the mastermind behind the assassination for years and wrote a book broaching that subject in 2017. So, his suspicion of Angleton and the CIA is not based on new information.

Secondly, LHO was just one of many individuals who had their mail opened by the CIA. All of these people were put on the list to have their mail checked for a specific reason. In Oswald's case, it was triggered by his 1959 defection to the Soviet Union. And only one piece of mail, a corespondence with his mother talking about potholders among other things, was opened.

But assuming Angleton lied about Oswald's mail being opened rather than just forgetting he was in the program, is there any reason he would prevaricate other than to cover up a massive conspiracy that he orchestrated? Angleton may have been simply seeking to cover-up the extent of the CIA's involvement with the assassin both to protect the agency's secret operations and to avoid speculation that they could have done more to protect the president. One who subscribes to this view is author and researcher Gerald Posner who recently said on X:

I wrote a piece recently that JFK’s assassination might have been preventable if the CIA shared with the FBI all the information about Oswald’s unhinged behavior in Mexico City just 6 weeks before Kennedy visited Dallas. Is the CIA complicit or responsible for the assassination? The evidence is not there, no matter how many times researchers like Jeff wish it were so.

Finally, Fred Litwin has done a series of articles on Morley's views on Angleton that is well worth reading. See also Litwin's take on the Luna hearings.

Morley has been all over the news media recently trying to convince everyone that there are revelations in the new JFK documents. But the evidence against LHO is overwhelming and Morley makes no attempt in this media blitz to explain how the accused assassin fits into a conspiracy or who, if Oswald did not pull the trigger as Morley now claims, did murder JFK. Morley is simply using this congressional hearing as a means to gain attention for his cause which is to blame the assassination on the CIA.