The Hidden Budget: How the U.S. Spent Millions to Shape the JFK Story

Newly declassified CIA and OMB records uncover covert funds used to contain, discredit, and bury the truth behind the assassination.

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💰 No Oversight, No Accountability

Most Americans don’t realize that in 1963, a large portion of U.S. intelligence spending operated under what was called “non-itemized emergency defense authorization.”

The 2025 records finally reveal what some of that money paid for after November 22:

• Media influence
• Witness suppression
• International coordination
• Psychological operations
• Controlled leaks and counter-narratives

This wasn’t just a cover-up-it was a funded campaign.

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📁 File Ref: “Project PALISADE – Discretionary Allocation Dockets”

In a March 1964 CIA finance memo, Project PALISADE is described as:

“An umbrella designation for post-event narrative stabilization and information sanitation regarding domestic Executive Termination Incident (ETI-63).”

Total budget noted:
$4.36 million - untraceable, off-ledger, approved directly through National Security Action Memorandum 276-B.

That memo was not available publicly until January 2025.

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🗞️ Media Management: Paid Influence

CIA records show a $600,000 budget line item for “independent press correspondence development.”

Translated:

Paying journalists to reinforce the lone gunman theory.

One cable from the CIA’s Domestic Contact Division notes:

“AP, UPI, and CBS onboard with simplified trajectory. NYT requires soft leverage-drafting response letter from ‘concerned citizen group.’”

Another expense: $40,000 to “develop and maintain private photographic archive for press distribution.”
This archive omitted certain images and enhanced others.

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🧠 Psychological Reinforcement Programs

Operation STILLPOINT (covered in Part 38) wasn’t cheap.

• $300k went to the Office of Research and Development (ORD) for “mass trauma response narrative profiling”
• $92k spent on “televised grief consistency” media scripting (including anchor talking points)
• $120k disbursed to an unnamed ad agency to design memorial framing campaigns-encouraging reflection over inquiry

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🚨 Witness Neutralization Fund

Perhaps most disturbing:
A CIA memo dated June 1964, titled “WPTX Disbursement Oversight,” details:

• $75k spent on relocation services for “uncooperative Dealey Plaza observers”
• $40k marked for “legal diversion strategies in peripheral homicide cases”
• Multiple entries coded as “C4R” – Classified Containment, Civilian

None of these were officially acknowledged until now.

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🔚 The Truth Wasn’t Hidden for Free

What the 2025 files make brutally clear is this:

The cover-up had a budget.

It was designed, resourced, and operationalized.

Millions were spent not to investigate the truth-but to erase it.