COINTELPRO (Counter Intelligence Program) was a series of covert FBI programs operating from 1956 to 1971 that targeted domestic political organizations the Bureau considered subversive. The programs used infiltration, snitch-jacketing, disinformation, manufactured evidence, legal harassment, and in some cases direct violence to disrupt, discredit, and destroy political movements.
The targets included the Communist Party USA (the first program, authorized in 1956), the Socialist Workers Party, the civil rights movement (including Martin Luther King Jr., whom the FBI attempted to drive to suicide), the Black Panther Party (which the FBI identified as the greatest threat to domestic security), the American Indian Movement (AIM), the Puerto Rican independence movement, and the anti-Vietnam War movement. The programs were not limited to surveillance — they actively intervened to destroy organizations by creating internal suspicion, fabricating criminal charges, fomenting rivalries between groups, and targeting leaders for prosecution, imprisonment, or assassination.
COINTELPRO was exposed through the 1971 Citizens’ Commission to Investigate the FBI break-in at the Media, Pennsylvania field office, and subsequently investigated by the Church Committee (1975–1976). The Church Committee’s findings documented systematic violations of civil liberties but led to reforms (FISA, congressional oversight) that have since been weakened and circumvented. The tactics COINTELPRO developed — particularly snitch-jacketing and the manufacture of suspicion within movements — continue to shape both state repression and movement security culture.