Trump administration releases 230,000 pages of MLK assassination files

The Trump administration has released more than 230,000 pages of documents related to the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., marking the most extensive public disclosure of federal records on the case to date.

The release was announced on Monday by National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard and was carried out in coordination with the Justice Department, FBI, CIA, and the National Archives, as part of President Donald Trump’s Executive Order 14176. The order, issued in January, directed agencies to fully declassify and release all records related to the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Senator Robert F. Kennedy, and Dr. King.

Unlike the majority of JFK files, which had been previously processed under the 1992 Assassination Records Collection Act, the MLK documents had never been digitized and remained largely inaccessible until now, the Office of the Director of the National Director (ODNI) said.

The newly released records include FBI investigative files detailing potential leads, internal memos tracking the progress of the case, and correspondence related to James Earl Ray—the man convicted of assassinating Dr. King—including statements from a former cellmate who claimed Ray spoke about an alleged assassination plot.

Additional documents include CIA intelligence gathered during the international search for Ray after he fled the United States, as well as foreign law enforcement records from a Canadian police department that became involved during his time abroad. The release also includes internal government communications spanning multiple agencies involved in the investigation.

The documents are now available to the public at archives.gov/mlk, where they have been published online with minimal redactions for privacy reasons, such as Social Security numbers and grand jury information. Additional files may be added as agencies continue reviewing their archives.

The King family was granted early access to the files two weeks before Monday’s release.

“We recognize that the release of documents concerning the assassination of our father, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., has long been a subject of interest, captivating public curiosity for decades,” Martin Luther King III and Dr. Bernice A. King said in a statement.

“As the children of Dr. King and Mrs. Coretta Scott King, his tragic death has been an intensely personal grief – a devastating loss for his wife, children, and the granddaughter he never met – an absence our family has endured for over 57 years,” the statement added. “We ask those who engage with the release of these files to do so with empathy, restraint, and respect for our family’s continuing grief.”

The publication of the MLK records follows the March 2025 release of the remaining JFK assassination files under the same executive order. At the time, President Trump said that all three cases—JFK, RFK, and MLK—deserved a complete and unredacted accounting.