Living Witnesses to the JFK Cover-Up to Testify on Capitol Hill
Rep. Luna's Task Force highlights those the government tried to silence
The House Task Force on Declassification is holding a second JFK hearing on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, May 20. Chaired by Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, the task force will air the stories of living witnesses to the government’s misconduct in the case of the murdered president.
(Full disclosure: I helped Luna and the staff of the House Oversight Committee on Oversight and Government Reform get in touch with witnesses because I think their stories are extraordinary and important.)
Abraham Bolden, a former Secret Service agent, will testify remotely. Bolden, now 90 years old, is a rare hero in the JFK assassination story. JFK brought him into the White House in 1961 as the first African-American to serve as a presidential bodyguard. After JFK was assassinated, Bolden reported on lax procedures around the president, for which he was fired and framed for bribery. Incredibly, no one at the Secret Service lost their job because of JFK’s assassination — except for Bolden, the only agent who didn’t go along with the cover-up once he understood the severity of the security problem.
Bolden is going to talk about his knowledge of a plot against JFK in Chicago in early November 1963.
Dan Hardway, a former HSCA investigator, will testify about how George Joannides, in his capacity as CIA liaison to the committee, stonewalled his efforts to investigate Oswald’s connections to the CIA. Hardway will describe his face-to-face encounters with Joannides.
Last month Rep. Luna asked CIA director John Ratcliffe for Joannides’ personnel file and four other documents or files related to the assassination. Last week, a CIA official told Rep. Luna that the agency would provide the requested material, after declassification process, taking “weeks.”
Judge John Tunheim, federal judge and former chair of the ARRB, will testify about how the CIA deliberated misled the board about Joannides’ work in 1963, and how the Secret Service destroyed key JFK files in 1995.
Dr. Don Curtis, a retired surgeon in Texas, will testify about trying to save JFK’s life at Parkland Hospital, where he was a resident in November 1963. Curtis will also testify about how Warren Commission lawyer Arlen Specter intimidated and coerced medical personnel whose testimony contradicted his preferred story of a “lone gunman.”
The hearing, open to the public, will held in House Visitors Center, Room 210, in the U.S. Capitol at 2 pm, May 20.
I sincerely hope all the members of the task force understand what an incredible opportunity this hearing presents to ask probing questions. They will never get an opportunity like this again. And as this latest round of document releases shows, every single word uttered by members and witnesses will be examined in great detail by researchers for years to come.
Abraham Bolden is a good man who was framed and imprisoned for years simply for telling truth to power.
He can shed light on the dark history of the JFK murder. The complicity of the Secret Service in the planning and execution of this coup is sickening.
James Rowley filed his report on the Chicago incident in such a way that the information would not be available to the agents on the ground in Dallas or to the FBI. Source Peter Dale Scott.
Emory Roberts called back Ss agents from the follow up car running to Kennedy’s aid.
In the McIntyre photo of both Kennedy’s limousine and the Ss follow up car (after going through the underpass) shows David Morales on the side board.
David Lifton had reported Jackie screaming at the agents in the Presidential Limousine and I discounted this report.
After seeing Morales in the follow up car, I now believe Lifton.