WEBVTT - COINTELPRO, Part 2 0:00:01.280 --> 0:00:04.320 Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production 0:00:04.360 --> 0:00:13.720 of I Heart Radio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. 0:00:13.760 --> 0:00:17.040 I'm Tracy V. Wilson and I'm Holly Fry. Today we 0:00:17.120 --> 0:00:20.760 are wrapping up our two parter on Cohen's Hell Pro 0:00:21.239 --> 0:00:25.759 including it's targeting of so called black nationalist slash hate 0:00:25.760 --> 0:00:29.880 groups UM and a targeting of a very vaguely defined 0:00:29.920 --> 0:00:33.479 movement known as the New Left. To briefly recap from 0:00:33.520 --> 0:00:37.120 part one, which is highly recommended before listening to this 0:00:37.200 --> 0:00:41.199 because it includes a lot of context and overview, But 0:00:41.320 --> 0:00:43.159 just as a quick recap, we're gonna quote from the 0:00:43.240 --> 0:00:46.880 Church Report, which followed more than a year of Senate 0:00:46.920 --> 0:00:50.880 Committee hearings into all this quote, the origins of Cohen's 0:00:50.920 --> 0:00:54.960 Hell pro demonstrate that the Bureau adopted extra legal methods 0:00:55.000 --> 0:00:58.560 to counter perceived threats to national security and public order 0:00:58.960 --> 0:01:02.760 because the ordinary legal processes were believed to be insufficient 0:01:02.800 --> 0:01:05.840 to do the job. In essence, the Bureau took the 0:01:05.920 --> 0:01:11.120 law into its own hands, conducting a sophisticated vigilante operation 0:01:11.280 --> 0:01:15.880 against domestic enemies. Whether those targets were really enemies, though, 0:01:16.160 --> 0:01:19.000 that is a different question. The report went on to say, 0:01:19.080 --> 0:01:23.080 quote the choice of individuals and organizations to be neutralized 0:01:23.200 --> 0:01:26.839 and disrupted ranged from the violent elements of the Black 0:01:26.880 --> 0:01:29.679 Panther Party to Martin Luther King Jr. Who the Bureau 0:01:29.800 --> 0:01:33.559 concedes was an advocate of non violence, from the Communist 0:01:33.560 --> 0:01:36.560 Party to the Ku Klux Klan, from the advocates of 0:01:36.720 --> 0:01:40.240 violent revolutions such as the Weatherman, to the supporters of 0:01:40.319 --> 0:01:44.280 peaceful social change, including the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and 0:01:44.319 --> 0:01:48.360 the Inter University Committee for Debate on Foreign Policy. Just 0:01:48.440 --> 0:01:50.360 a heads up in this episode, there are going to 0:01:50.440 --> 0:01:54.040 be some discussions of suicide and also police violence. In 0:01:54.120 --> 0:01:57.840 nineteen sixty seven, the FBI started co Intel pro Black 0:01:57.960 --> 0:02:01.800 Nationalist hate groups. For the most part, targeting of civil 0:02:01.880 --> 0:02:04.279 rights groups that had been carried out under co Intel 0:02:04.280 --> 0:02:08.360 pro CPUSA, which we talked about last time, rolled up 0:02:08.440 --> 0:02:12.240 under this newly established program. In the words of the 0:02:12.240 --> 0:02:16.040 program supervisor, the targeted groups were selected because they were 0:02:16.080 --> 0:02:19.200 believed to be violent or because of their quote radical 0:02:19.360 --> 0:02:25.480 or revolutionary rhetoric and actions. On March four, FBI Director 0:02:25.600 --> 0:02:28.800 j Edgar Hoover sent a memo to be routed through 0:02:28.960 --> 0:02:34.200 forty one FBI field offices. This memo was called counterintelligence program, 0:02:34.280 --> 0:02:38.240 black nationalist hate groups, racial intelligence. And this is a 0:02:38.240 --> 0:02:41.520 little bit long, but it's so illustrative of what the 0:02:41.600 --> 0:02:45.600 FBI was doing here and more generally, what Hoover's mindset 0:02:45.760 --> 0:02:48.440 was across the other co intel pros. We're going to 0:02:48.520 --> 0:02:51.639 read a chunk of it. So it began quote goals 0:02:52.200 --> 0:02:56.120 for maximum effectiveness of the counterintelligence program and to prevent 0:02:56.160 --> 0:03:00.519 wasted effort. Long range goals are being set. Number one, 0:03:01.040 --> 0:03:05.640 prevent the coalition of militant black nationalist groups. In unity, 0:03:05.680 --> 0:03:08.680 there is strength, a truism that is no less valid 0:03:08.720 --> 0:03:13.040 for all its triteness. An effective coalition of black nationalist 0:03:13.040 --> 0:03:15.720 groups might be the first step toward a real mau 0:03:15.760 --> 0:03:19.720 Mau in America, the beginning of a true Black revolution. So, 0:03:19.800 --> 0:03:22.280 for context, mau Mau is a reference to the Mau 0:03:22.320 --> 0:03:26.160 Mao movement and uprising in Kenya, which advocated a violent 0:03:26.240 --> 0:03:30.800 overthrow of British colonial rule. This went on to prevent 0:03:30.960 --> 0:03:34.720 the rise of a messiah who could unify and electrify 0:03:34.800 --> 0:03:38.720 the militant black nationalist movement. Malcolm X might have been 0:03:38.760 --> 0:03:41.800 such a messiah. He is the martyr of the movement today. 0:03:42.440 --> 0:03:46.560 Martin Luther King stokely. Carmichael and Elijah Mohammed all aspire 0:03:46.600 --> 0:03:49.800 to this position. Elijah Mohammed is less of a threat 0:03:49.840 --> 0:03:52.640 because of his age, King could be a very real 0:03:52.680 --> 0:03:56.320 contender for this position should he abandon his supposed quote 0:03:56.360 --> 0:04:01.400 obedience to quote white liberal doctrines and at sees nonviolence 0:04:01.920 --> 0:04:06.320 and embrace Black nationalism. Carmichael has the necessary charisma to 0:04:06.360 --> 0:04:10.160 be a real threat in this way. Number three prevent 0:04:10.360 --> 0:04:14.480 violence on the part of black nationalist groups. This is 0:04:14.480 --> 0:04:17.919 of primary importance and is of course a goal of 0:04:17.920 --> 0:04:21.200 our investigative activity. It should also be a goal of 0:04:21.200 --> 0:04:26.000 the counter intelligence program to pinpoint potential troublemakers and neutralize 0:04:26.040 --> 0:04:30.120 them before they exercise their potential for violence. Number four 0:04:30.279 --> 0:04:35.480 prevent militant black nationalist groups and leaders from gaining respectability 0:04:35.520 --> 0:04:39.920 by discrediting them to three separate segments of the community. 0:04:40.080 --> 0:04:43.760 The goal of discrediting black nationalists must be handled tactically 0:04:43.839 --> 0:04:47.600 in three ways. You must discredit those groups and individuals 0:04:47.640 --> 0:04:51.760 to first, the responsible Negro community. Second, they must be 0:04:51.839 --> 0:04:55.479 discredited to the white community. Both the responsible community and 0:04:55.520 --> 0:04:59.200 to liberals who have vestiges of sympathy for militant black 0:04:59.320 --> 0:05:03.920 nationalist Simply because they are negroes. Third, these groups must 0:05:03.960 --> 0:05:07.720 be discredited in the eyes of Negro radicals the followers 0:05:07.760 --> 0:05:12.400 of the movement. This last area requires entirely different tactics 0:05:12.440 --> 0:05:16.919 from the first two. Publicity about violent tendencies and radical 0:05:17.000 --> 0:05:20.760 statements merely enhances black nationalists to the last group. It 0:05:20.839 --> 0:05:25.160 adds respectability in a different way. Number five. A final 0:05:25.240 --> 0:05:27.960 goal should be to prevent the long range growth of 0:05:28.000 --> 0:05:33.480 militant black organizations, especially among youths. Specific tactics to prevent 0:05:33.520 --> 0:05:37.240 these groups from converting young people must be developed. This 0:05:37.440 --> 0:05:40.200 memo went on to outline the primary targets of this 0:05:40.279 --> 0:05:43.720 Cohen's help pro that everything we just read was going 0:05:43.760 --> 0:05:47.560 to apply to These were the organizations that Hoover described 0:05:47.680 --> 0:05:53.039 as the quote most violent and radical. It included the 0:05:53.160 --> 0:05:58.080 Student Non Violent Coordinating Committee, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, 0:05:58.440 --> 0:06:02.400 Revolutionary Action Movement, and the Nation of Islam. This is 0:06:02.440 --> 0:06:09.040 an incredibly weird list. Snake has non violent right into 0:06:09.080 --> 0:06:13.200 the name, like the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Martin Luther 0:06:13.279 --> 0:06:17.080 King Jr. Helped found this represents the whole spectrum of 0:06:17.400 --> 0:06:22.920 from non violent direct action to revolutionary Black nationalism, and 0:06:23.000 --> 0:06:26.440 the FBI even noted that in its view, some individual 0:06:26.520 --> 0:06:29.760 members of the Nation of Islam had been involved in violence, 0:06:30.080 --> 0:06:32.680 but the organization itself was not violent. It was being 0:06:32.720 --> 0:06:37.039 targeted because of its separatism. Basically, the FBI grouped a 0:06:37.040 --> 0:06:40.600 lot of different organizations with a wide range of objectives 0:06:40.600 --> 0:06:44.640 and ideologies and tactics under this co intel pro that 0:06:44.720 --> 0:06:49.680 was supposedly about black nationalism and hate groups. Some, as 0:06:49.720 --> 0:06:54.560 Tracy just mentioned, were strictly pacifist, Some advocated gun ownership 0:06:54.720 --> 0:06:59.320 or violent self defense, Some spoke in very theoretical terms 0:06:59.360 --> 0:07:02.080 about the need for a revolution, and some of them 0:07:02.160 --> 0:07:06.000 called for an actual armed uprising or other violence. All 0:07:06.200 --> 0:07:09.680 very different ideologies, but still under this one umbrella. The 0:07:09.840 --> 0:07:13.360 FBI classed them all together as violent and radical, viewing 0:07:13.440 --> 0:07:17.080 virtually any organization calling for equal rights for black people 0:07:17.440 --> 0:07:20.880 as potentially violent and as a consequence, as needing to 0:07:20.920 --> 0:07:23.840 be disrupted. Yeah. Like, the thing that that these all 0:07:23.880 --> 0:07:28.280 had in common was like black people say quality equality please, 0:07:29.760 --> 0:07:33.560 or like demanding equality with very aggressive rhetoric and sometimes violence. Like, 0:07:33.600 --> 0:07:36.360 that's what it all had in common. The FBI put 0:07:36.440 --> 0:07:40.040 intense effort into discrediting and disrupting all these organizations and 0:07:40.080 --> 0:07:43.240 other organizations that were not specifically named using all the 0:07:43.280 --> 0:07:46.000 methods that we talked about in Part one. But about 0:07:46.040 --> 0:07:49.120 a year after this Coin's Hell Pro was established, another 0:07:49.280 --> 0:07:52.400 different organization rose to national prominence, and that was the 0:07:52.440 --> 0:07:56.160 Black Panther Party, and this Coin's Hell Pro then pivoted 0:07:56.200 --> 0:07:59.800 to shift almost exclusively on that. The Black Panther Party, 0:08:00.000 --> 0:08:03.400 originally called the Black Panther Party for Self Defense, was 0:08:03.440 --> 0:08:06.880 founded in Oakland, California, in nineteen sixty six by Huey 0:08:06.920 --> 0:08:10.360 Newton and Bobby Seal. A lot of the Black Panthers 0:08:10.440 --> 0:08:14.480 rhetoric was radical and revolutionary, arguing that the only way 0:08:14.520 --> 0:08:17.160 black people could be truly free is if they were 0:08:17.200 --> 0:08:20.720 able to govern their own affairs. When they were establishing 0:08:20.920 --> 0:08:24.320 the party, Newton and Seal crafted a ten point program 0:08:24.360 --> 0:08:28.280 which began, we want freedom, We want power to determine 0:08:28.280 --> 0:08:31.840 the destiny of our black community. This ten point program 0:08:31.880 --> 0:08:34.960 went on to call for full employment, an end to 0:08:35.240 --> 0:08:39.000 quote the robbery by the capitalists of our black community, 0:08:39.200 --> 0:08:43.520 decent housing, education, exemption from military service for black men, 0:08:44.000 --> 0:08:47.400 an end to police brutality, freedom for black men who 0:08:47.400 --> 0:08:50.360 were held in prisons and jails, and it ended quote 0:08:50.360 --> 0:08:55.360 we want land, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice, and peace. 0:08:55.800 --> 0:08:59.120 The Ten Point Plan elaborated on each of these points. 0:08:59.720 --> 0:09:02.840 The eemption from military service stemmed from the United States 0:09:02.920 --> 0:09:06.040 involvement in Vietnam and the idea that black people should 0:09:06.120 --> 0:09:08.559 not be forced to serve in the military of a 0:09:08.679 --> 0:09:12.000 nation that did not protect them. The idea behind the 0:09:12.040 --> 0:09:14.520 release of incarcerated black men was that they had not 0:09:14.640 --> 0:09:17.840 been given a fair and impartial trial, so their convictions 0:09:18.080 --> 0:09:21.000 were not valid. As part of their work, the Black 0:09:21.040 --> 0:09:24.920 Panthers started more than thirty community service programs known as 0:09:24.960 --> 0:09:29.480 survival programs. These included things like free breakfast programs for 0:09:29.520 --> 0:09:34.320 school children, a tuberculosis screening and treatment program, medical clinics, 0:09:34.559 --> 0:09:38.959 ambulance services, legal aid, and education programs. The Black Panthers 0:09:39.000 --> 0:09:42.080 also created a screening program for sickle cell disease that 0:09:42.240 --> 0:09:45.560 later served as a template for the federal government's own 0:09:45.679 --> 0:09:49.320 screening programs. Over time, a lot of these services were 0:09:49.320 --> 0:09:53.640 expanded to include anyone who was oppressed, including poor white people. 0:09:53.960 --> 0:09:57.240 The Black Panthers also showed up to support other marginalized 0:09:57.240 --> 0:10:00.440 groups in their own activism. They are meant in two 0:10:00.480 --> 0:10:04.120 different times in our Six Impossible episodes, from Sippins to 0:10:04.240 --> 0:10:09.120 fish Ins, which focused on direct action demonstrations and similar protests. 0:10:09.840 --> 0:10:12.600 In that episode, we talked about the Black Panthers support 0:10:12.640 --> 0:10:15.520 of the fish In movement in the Pacific Northwest, and 0:10:15.840 --> 0:10:18.800 they're providing meals to disabled activists who took over the 0:10:18.800 --> 0:10:22.640 Department of Health, Education and Welfare office in San Francisco 0:10:23.000 --> 0:10:26.360 during the Section five oh four protests. But today, the 0:10:26.400 --> 0:10:28.880 first thing a lot of people, especially a lot of 0:10:28.880 --> 0:10:32.239 white people, think of when someone says the Black Panthers 0:10:32.520 --> 0:10:36.720 is guns and violence. The Black Panthers organized armed patrols 0:10:36.720 --> 0:10:40.040 of black neighborhoods to protect residents from police brutality and 0:10:40.080 --> 0:10:43.400 from gang violence. At one point, they staged an armed 0:10:43.440 --> 0:10:46.760 takeover of the California State Legislature that was in response 0:10:46.840 --> 0:10:50.680 to gun control legislation. As other examples outside of the 0:10:50.679 --> 0:10:54.320 party's organized activities, Huie Newton was involved in a shootout 0:10:54.320 --> 0:10:57.000 with police in nineteen sixty seven in which an officer 0:10:57.120 --> 0:11:00.840 was killed. Bobby Seal was charged but not convicted, with 0:11:00.920 --> 0:11:04.240 conspiracy to incite riots at the nineteen sixty eight Democratic 0:11:04.320 --> 0:11:07.320 National Convention and of the murder of a nineteen year 0:11:07.360 --> 0:11:09.720 old Black Panther who was suspected of being a police 0:11:09.760 --> 0:11:13.640 informant in a memo back to headquarters. A California field 0:11:13.679 --> 0:11:17.280 office described the Black Panthers as quote the most violence 0:11:17.320 --> 0:11:21.000 prone organization of all the extremist groups now operating in 0:11:21.040 --> 0:11:24.480 the United States, and that alleged that they were performing 0:11:24.600 --> 0:11:29.720 quote not only verbal attacks but also physical attacks on police. Later, 0:11:29.840 --> 0:11:32.360 j Edgar Hoover called the Black Panthers quote one of 0:11:32.400 --> 0:11:37.920 the greatest threats to the nation's internal security. On November night, 0:11:38.320 --> 0:11:42.200 several FBI field offices received a memo ordering them to 0:11:42.280 --> 0:11:47.360 submit quote imaginative and hard hitting counter intelligence measures aimed 0:11:47.400 --> 0:11:50.760 at crippling the BPP, of course, the Black Panther Party. 0:11:51.640 --> 0:11:55.880 This directive was expanded to additional field offices in January 0:11:55.920 --> 0:11:59.400 of nineteen sixty nine. Kellen's held pro black nationalist hate 0:11:59.440 --> 0:12:03.240 groups soon focused almost entirely on the Black Panthers, rather 0:12:03.320 --> 0:12:06.120 than on that collection of groups that we outlined earlier 0:12:06.160 --> 0:12:09.760 in that nine eight memo of this co intell prose, 0:12:09.840 --> 0:12:14.439 two documented actions, two hundred thirty three of them were 0:12:14.480 --> 0:12:17.599 against the Black Panthers, using all those various techniques that 0:12:17.640 --> 0:12:21.920 we described in Part one as examples, the FBI intentionally 0:12:22.040 --> 0:12:26.080 undermined the Black Panthers public service programs, for example, by 0:12:26.160 --> 0:12:30.840 sending fake, inflammatory membership materials to food pantries and other 0:12:30.960 --> 0:12:35.040 organizations that were donating food for the breakfast programs. The 0:12:35.080 --> 0:12:38.840 Bureau used disinformation to try to spark violent conflicts between 0:12:38.840 --> 0:12:42.720 the Panthers an area street gangs, and to spark violent 0:12:42.760 --> 0:12:46.400 conflicts between the Panthers and police to reinforce the idea 0:12:46.480 --> 0:12:50.480 that the Black Panthers were just inherently violent. In nineteen 0:12:50.600 --> 0:12:54.480 sixty nine, the FBI became aware of a Black Panther 0:12:54.800 --> 0:12:57.800 coloring book. The origins of this book are a little 0:12:57.800 --> 0:13:01.080 bit marky, but I can find a Cambone, who was 0:13:01.160 --> 0:13:04.679 then known as Mark Teamer, has taken credit for its creation, 0:13:05.280 --> 0:13:09.040 and in interview he describes it as a history book. 0:13:09.520 --> 0:13:14.520 It depicts slave owners, greedy store owners, and police all 0:13:14.559 --> 0:13:19.800 as obese pigs with exaggerated lower tusks. While Cambone has 0:13:19.880 --> 0:13:22.760 stressed that these pigs can be any color, which is 0:13:22.760 --> 0:13:25.960 why it is a coloring book, they are generally interpreted 0:13:26.000 --> 0:13:29.800 as representations of white people, and this book is full 0:13:29.880 --> 0:13:33.120 of images of black people, adults and children, men and 0:13:33.160 --> 0:13:37.840 women stabbing and shooting the pigs. Black Panther leadership felt 0:13:37.880 --> 0:13:41.160 that the coloring book was inappropriate and ordered Cambone to 0:13:41.240 --> 0:13:45.360 destroy it, but someone made copies, and after the FBI 0:13:45.440 --> 0:13:49.000 obtained one, it made more copies and distributed them as 0:13:49.040 --> 0:13:52.079 though the Black Panther Party had officially created this book 0:13:52.559 --> 0:13:56.040 with the intent of distributing it to children. The FBI 0:13:56.080 --> 0:13:59.040 has harassment of the Black Panthers also went beyond the 0:13:59.160 --> 0:14:03.760 organization's membership and its programs. Jean Seeberg was an actress 0:14:03.760 --> 0:14:06.080 who donated to the Black Panthers and support of their 0:14:06.120 --> 0:14:10.959 breakfast programs. During her pregnancy, the FBI sent false tips 0:14:11.000 --> 0:14:14.840 to news organizations alleging that the father of her baby 0:14:14.920 --> 0:14:18.440 was a Black Panther. This, of course, was a huge scandal. 0:14:18.960 --> 0:14:21.680 Seeberg tried to take her own life. As a result, 0:14:21.760 --> 0:14:25.320 she went into labor prematurely and her baby died. According 0:14:25.360 --> 0:14:27.920 to family members, she tried to take her own life 0:14:27.960 --> 0:14:30.240 every year around the time of the baby's death, and 0:14:30.240 --> 0:14:33.200 then she died in nineteen seventy nine. Her death was 0:14:33.320 --> 0:14:36.640 ruled a suicide, although some of her families had suspicions 0:14:36.680 --> 0:14:40.640 that there was foul play involved, and, perhaps most notoriously, 0:14:40.800 --> 0:14:44.760 on December fourth, nineteen sixty nine, the FBI orchestrated a 0:14:44.880 --> 0:14:47.840 raid that was carried out by Chicago police, who fired 0:14:47.840 --> 0:14:51.520 between eighty two and ninety nine gunshots into an apartment 0:14:51.760 --> 0:14:54.480 where several members of the Black Panther Party were sleeping. 0:14:55.000 --> 0:14:59.040 Among other involvement, and FBI informant had provided police with 0:14:59.080 --> 0:15:03.040 a floor plan of the apartment. Chicago Black Panther leaders 0:15:03.040 --> 0:15:06.120 Fred Hampton and Mark Clark were killed and four other 0:15:06.160 --> 0:15:10.000 people in the apartment were seriously injured. Police claimed that 0:15:10.040 --> 0:15:12.960 this was a violent gunfight, with the Black Panthers being 0:15:12.960 --> 0:15:16.520 the first to open fire, but an investigation revealed that 0:15:16.600 --> 0:15:19.920 only one shot had been fired from inside the apartment, 0:15:20.360 --> 0:15:23.960 most likely by Mark Clark after he had already been 0:15:24.160 --> 0:15:28.520 fatally shot by police. According to Hampton's fiance, Debra Johnson, 0:15:28.560 --> 0:15:31.520 who was in bed asleep with him when the shooting started, 0:15:31.840 --> 0:15:34.520 an officer who came into the apartment after the shooting 0:15:34.560 --> 0:15:38.600 stopped asked if Hampton was still alive. Another officer fired 0:15:38.640 --> 0:15:42.080 two shots and said he's good and dead now. The 0:15:42.120 --> 0:15:45.160 Black Panther Party dissolved in nineteen eight two, with co 0:15:45.320 --> 0:15:48.280 intel probe being one of the many factors that contributed 0:15:48.320 --> 0:15:51.800 to its end. Former members say it is unrelated to 0:15:51.840 --> 0:15:54.800 the New Black Panther Party, which was founded in ninety 0:15:54.920 --> 0:15:57.440 nine and is classified as a hate group by the 0:15:57.520 --> 0:16:00.960 United States Commission on Civil Rights in the Southern Poverty 0:16:01.040 --> 0:16:12.720 Law Center. Let's take a break. The last formal coincal 0:16:12.800 --> 0:16:16.320 pro that was described in the Senate investigation reports we're 0:16:16.320 --> 0:16:18.400 going to talk about in a little bit was coincal 0:16:18.480 --> 0:16:22.280 pro New Left, and that started in and of all 0:16:22.360 --> 0:16:26.520 the formally named coincal pros, this was the most loosely focused. 0:16:26.640 --> 0:16:29.800 And I mean, as we've discussed, most of them were 0:16:29.840 --> 0:16:33.560 loosely focused. As we mentioned in part one, the FBI 0:16:33.680 --> 0:16:37.280 didn't really even have a definition for what new Left meant. 0:16:38.040 --> 0:16:41.520 The New Left supervisor, who was quoted in the Church 0:16:41.520 --> 0:16:45.520 Committee report said quote, I cannot recall any document that 0:16:45.640 --> 0:16:48.640 was written defining new Left is such. It is my 0:16:48.720 --> 0:16:52.280 impression that the characterization of new Left groups, rather than 0:16:52.320 --> 0:16:55.400 being defined at any specific time by document, it more 0:16:55.480 --> 0:16:58.960 or less grew. It has never been strictly defined as 0:16:59.000 --> 0:17:01.680 far as I know. It is more or less an attitude. 0:17:02.000 --> 0:17:04.520 I would think that makes it sound almost like an 0:17:04.560 --> 0:17:09.000 advertiser sound bite new Left. It's an attitude. Uh. The 0:17:09.040 --> 0:17:12.480 incident that prompted the FBI to create this co Intel. 0:17:12.520 --> 0:17:16.520 Pro was a student uprising at Columbia University in ninety 0:17:17.400 --> 0:17:19.840 There was a lot involved in this protest, but its 0:17:19.880 --> 0:17:23.480 most direct precursor was the university's decision to build a 0:17:23.520 --> 0:17:27.439 new gym in Morningside Park. Even though the gym was 0:17:27.480 --> 0:17:30.639 being planned for public land, its facilities would mostly be 0:17:30.760 --> 0:17:33.800 for use only by the university and not by the public. 0:17:34.440 --> 0:17:36.960 To add to that frustration, this was part of an 0:17:36.960 --> 0:17:40.960 ongoing pattern of the university's expansion into Harlem, which was 0:17:41.000 --> 0:17:44.560 pushing the neighborhoods predominantly black residents out of their homes 0:17:44.640 --> 0:17:47.320 in order to build facilities that they were not going 0:17:47.359 --> 0:17:51.480 to be allowed to access. So the resulting protest was complicated, 0:17:52.680 --> 0:17:55.320 Like we cannot get all into all of the nuances here, 0:17:55.400 --> 0:18:00.040 but generally, the university's Student Afro American Society or s 0:18:00.040 --> 0:18:04.040 a S started voicing their own and the community's objections 0:18:04.080 --> 0:18:06.800 to this gym, and then the school's chapter of the 0:18:06.800 --> 0:18:10.879 Students for a Democratic Society or SDS, which was predominantly white, 0:18:11.400 --> 0:18:14.879 saw this as an opportunity for a larger protest that 0:18:14.920 --> 0:18:18.800 would also focus on the university's involvement with the Vietnam War. 0:18:19.720 --> 0:18:21.479 Members of the s a S felt like they were 0:18:21.520 --> 0:18:24.159 being talked over and that the SDS was taking the 0:18:24.200 --> 0:18:28.280 protests in an entirely different direction. And the end, the 0:18:28.359 --> 0:18:32.359 Student Afro American Society took over Hamilton's Hall and the 0:18:32.440 --> 0:18:35.520 Students for a Democratic Society took over other buildings on 0:18:35.600 --> 0:18:38.880 campus and took the Dean hostage. There were more than 0:18:38.920 --> 0:18:43.240 a thousand demonstrators who took part in this campus shutdown 0:18:43.320 --> 0:18:46.919 that lasted for a week. At the university's request, the 0:18:46.960 --> 0:18:51.080 New York Police Department began clearing the demonstrators on April nine. 0:18:52.680 --> 0:18:56.840 Black demonstrators who had taken over Hamilton's Hall left peacefully, 0:18:56.880 --> 0:18:59.199 but as more than one thousand police moved into the 0:18:59.200 --> 0:19:03.879 other building, some of the other demonstrators verbally and physically resisted, 0:19:04.200 --> 0:19:08.560 including by throwing things like shoes, bathroom tiles, and books 0:19:08.560 --> 0:19:13.000 at officers. Police forcibly removed people, beating some of the 0:19:13.040 --> 0:19:17.400 resisting students and in some cases bystanders with night sticks. 0:19:17.720 --> 0:19:22.000 Others were trampled. In the end, one hundred thirty two students, 0:19:22.200 --> 0:19:26.359 four faculty members, and twelve police officers were injured. So 0:19:26.480 --> 0:19:30.000 co incal pro New Left was motivated by the FBI's 0:19:30.080 --> 0:19:33.640 frustrations that the university had not brought in police earlier, 0:19:34.200 --> 0:19:36.520 and also by a sense that these types of protests 0:19:36.560 --> 0:19:38.879 should not be permitted to happen in the first place. 0:19:39.440 --> 0:19:43.000 The directives for coincal pro New Left were distributed by 0:19:43.040 --> 0:19:47.000 a memo in May of nineteen eight, and as described 0:19:47.119 --> 0:19:50.520 in the Church Report, agents were to gather information on 0:19:50.640 --> 0:19:54.320 this is all a quote. One false allegations of police 0:19:54.320 --> 0:19:58.200 brutality to quote, counter the widespread charges of police brutality 0:19:58.240 --> 0:20:04.480 that invariably arise following student police encounters. Two immorality depicting 0:20:04.480 --> 0:20:09.160 the quote scurless and depraved nature of many of the characters, activities, habits, 0:20:09.160 --> 0:20:13.040 and living conditions representative of New Left adherents. And three 0:20:13.840 --> 0:20:17.640 action by college administrators to quote to show the value 0:20:17.720 --> 0:20:21.920 of college administrators and school officials taking a firm stand 0:20:22.400 --> 0:20:25.520 and pointing out quote whether and to what extent faculty 0:20:25.560 --> 0:20:30.040 members rendered aid and encouragement. Point to sounds like a 0:20:30.160 --> 0:20:33.439 lot of the other counterintelligence efforts we've talked about in 0:20:33.480 --> 0:20:38.040 co intel pros, but otherwise in the FBI's view, the 0:20:38.240 --> 0:20:42.200 use of force against demonstrators was warranted and if demonstrators 0:20:42.200 --> 0:20:46.240 were injured in the process, they deserved it. In night, 0:20:46.320 --> 0:20:49.359 both the FBI and the NYPD viewed the amount of 0:20:49.400 --> 0:20:53.640 force used at Columbia as appropriate and restrained. No tear 0:20:53.680 --> 0:20:56.639 gas was used, no one was shot, and the injuries 0:20:56.640 --> 0:20:59.840 sustained by students and faculty were minor enough that the 0:21:00.119 --> 0:21:02.800 who had to go to the hospital were treated and released. 0:21:03.840 --> 0:21:06.960 That's just such such a weird bar, to such a 0:21:07.000 --> 0:21:09.879 weird bar of whether their use was appropriate. The use 0:21:09.920 --> 0:21:12.480 of forces appropriate was like, well, okay, nobody like died, 0:21:12.760 --> 0:21:17.679 was kind of the tone of it. However, the FBI 0:21:17.920 --> 0:21:21.760 also had a similar interpretation in cases of police brutality 0:21:21.800 --> 0:21:25.760 that we're far more clearly egregious. For example, after riots 0:21:25.760 --> 0:21:29.320 broke out during the nine Democratic National Convention in Chicago, 0:21:29.760 --> 0:21:33.639 a memo from FBI headquarters to the Chicago Field Office 0:21:33.680 --> 0:21:37.400 read quote, once again, the liberal press and the bleeding 0:21:37.480 --> 0:21:40.080 hearts and the forces on the left are taking advantage 0:21:40.080 --> 0:21:43.680 of the situation in Chicago surrounding the Democratic National Convention 0:21:43.720 --> 0:21:47.760 to attack the police and organized law enforcement agencies. We 0:21:47.800 --> 0:21:50.600 should be mindful of this situation and develop all possible 0:21:50.680 --> 0:21:56.320 evidence to expose this activity and to refute these false allegations. Conversely, 0:21:56.520 --> 0:21:59.520 the Walker Report, which was prepared for the National Commission 0:21:59.560 --> 0:22:02.600 on the Call Is in Prevention of Violence, concluded that 0:22:02.600 --> 0:22:06.639 there really was police wrongdoing a portion of it read quote. 0:22:06.720 --> 0:22:10.719 Demonstrators attacked too, and they posed difficult problems for police 0:22:10.760 --> 0:22:14.240 as they persisted in marching through the streets, blocking traffic 0:22:14.280 --> 0:22:17.560 and intersections. But it was the police who forced them 0:22:17.560 --> 0:22:20.240 out of the park and into the neighborhood. And on 0:22:20.280 --> 0:22:23.120 the part of the police, there was enough wild club swinging, 0:22:23.560 --> 0:22:27.000 enough cries of hatred, enough gratuitous beating to make the 0:22:27.040 --> 0:22:32.000 conclusion inescapable that individual policemen, and lots of them, committed 0:22:32.040 --> 0:22:35.480 violent acts far in excess of the requisite force for 0:22:35.600 --> 0:22:40.240 crowd dispersal or arrests. To read dispassionately the hundreds of 0:22:40.280 --> 0:22:44.320 statements describing at firsthand the events of Sunday and Monday 0:22:44.440 --> 0:22:47.320 nights is to become convinced of the presence of what 0:22:47.440 --> 0:22:50.760 can only be called a police riot. So while coen 0:22:50.800 --> 0:22:54.679 falpro New Left was ostensibly about targeting this very vaguely 0:22:54.720 --> 0:22:58.240 defined collection of left wing demonstrators as being a threat 0:22:58.240 --> 0:23:01.920 to national security, it also paired up with this sense 0:23:02.000 --> 0:23:06.440 of a much needed law enforcement crackdown that was justified 0:23:06.480 --> 0:23:10.520 and necessary, and the need to protect police and other 0:23:10.600 --> 0:23:15.120 law enforcement from false accusations of brutality. Aside from that, 0:23:15.280 --> 0:23:17.680 it is difficult to talk about co intel Pro New 0:23:17.760 --> 0:23:22.440 Left in a cohesive way. The counter intelligence program wound 0:23:22.520 --> 0:23:25.639 up targeting virtually every anti war group in the US, 0:23:25.800 --> 0:23:29.239 as well as student demonstrators who were demonstrating for just 0:23:29.359 --> 0:23:32.840 about any reason. In the words of the Church Report quote, 0:23:33.200 --> 0:23:36.560 none of the Bureau witnesses deposed believes the New Left 0:23:36.600 --> 0:23:40.320 co intel Pro was generally effective, in part because of 0:23:40.359 --> 0:23:44.600 the imprecise targeting. Also, the tone of a lot of 0:23:44.600 --> 0:23:48.680 the FBI memos regarding the New Left sound almost baffled. 0:23:49.160 --> 0:23:51.439 Agents really did not get these young people, most of 0:23:51.480 --> 0:23:54.040 them white and affluent, a lot of them looking like 0:23:54.119 --> 0:23:58.840 stereotypical hippies agitating against things like police brutality in the 0:23:58.920 --> 0:24:03.560 Vietnam War. Memos include kind of perplexed sounding references to 0:24:03.640 --> 0:24:09.760 things like yoga and drugs. Participants in the organization's targeted 0:24:09.840 --> 0:24:12.520 under co intel Pro. New Left also tended to be 0:24:12.600 --> 0:24:17.200 simultaneously idealistic and cynical, so the Bureau had a harder 0:24:17.240 --> 0:24:22.880 time finding informants or infiltrating organizations. For example, the main 0:24:23.000 --> 0:24:26.159 phone at the national headquarters of Students for a Democratic 0:24:26.200 --> 0:24:29.119 Society had a sign taped to it for more than 0:24:29.160 --> 0:24:33.920 a year that said, in capital letters, this phone is tapped. Yeah. 0:24:33.920 --> 0:24:36.720 That is not to suggest that the other targeted organizations 0:24:36.720 --> 0:24:41.640 were clueless, like they were just particularly cynical about the 0:24:41.680 --> 0:24:45.240 Bureau by this point. The people who ultimately got the 0:24:45.280 --> 0:24:49.240 ball rolling on exposing Cointel pro were members of anti 0:24:49.280 --> 0:24:52.639 war and other activist movements that had been targeted during 0:24:52.640 --> 0:24:55.720 these programs history, and we'll talk more about that after 0:24:55.760 --> 0:25:07.640 a SPONSI break. Counterintelligence is still part of the FBI's work, 0:25:08.000 --> 0:25:11.600 but in terms of these formally named Cohen cell prose, 0:25:11.880 --> 0:25:13.960 those came to an end thanks to the work of 0:25:14.000 --> 0:25:17.840 some regular people who pulled off a heist. When we 0:25:17.880 --> 0:25:21.920 say regular people, they included a cab driver, a daycare 0:25:21.960 --> 0:25:25.439 center director, a social worker, and a professor. It sounds 0:25:25.480 --> 0:25:28.520 like one of those walk into a bar jokes. I know. 0:25:28.800 --> 0:25:31.920 It's my favorite part of these episodes for the number 0:25:31.920 --> 0:25:34.960 of reasons, one of them being it's the most straightforward. Yeah. 0:25:35.000 --> 0:25:38.639