COINTELPRO Begins

In August 1956, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover authorized COINTELPRO-CPUSA, the first of what would become a series of covert counterintelligence programs targeting domestic political organizations. The initial program targeted the Communist Party USA; subsequent programs expanded to the Socialist Workers Party (1961), white supremacist groups (1964), Black nationalist organizations including the Black Panther Party (1967), and the “New Left” including the anti-war movement (1968).

The programs operated covertly until 1971, when the Citizens’ Commission to Investigate the FBI broke into the FBI’s field office in Media, Pennsylvania and released internal documents to journalists. The full scope of the programs was subsequently documented by the Church Committee (1975–1976).