FBI COINTELPRO program systematically targeted and disrupted civil rights groups

On the night of March 8, 1971, burglars broke into an FBI field office in Media, Pennsylvania. What they found inside would eventually unravel one of the most significant abuses of power by a federal agency in American history. Among the stolen documents were references to a program the FBI had kept secret for over a decade: COINTELPRO.

For years, civil rights activists, particularly those involved in the Black Power movement, had complained that federal agents were following them, infiltrating their organizations, and spreading disinformation to sow discord within their ranks. The FBI denied these allegations. Bureau leadership, including Director J. Edgar Hoover, insisted that such operations were either fabrications or necessary counterintelligence work to prevent violence and protect national security. The mainstream media largely accepted these denials.

The stolen documents told a different story. Once the media began publishing them, Congress launched investigations that would confirm the activists' worst suspicions. Between 1956 and 1971, the FBI had operated a systematic campaign called COINTELPRO to infiltrate, discredit, and disrupt domestic political organizations. The targets went far beyond what the government claimed was necessary—civil rights groups, anti-war activists, environmentalists, and countless others fell under surveillance and active disruption.

The methods were chilling in their sophistication. FBI agents posed as members to encourage illegal activities, then arrested the activists they had radicalized. They created fake letters to turn allies against each other. They sent threatening correspondence to leaders like Martin Luther King Jr., even threatening him with public exposure of alleged affairs in an attempt to destroy his credibility. The program was authorized at the highest levels of hierarchy, with evidence showing Hoover personally approved operations against civil rights leaders.