Killing Kennedy: The End of Camelot

President Kennedy meets Martin Luther King Jr. in the White House Rose Garden, mentions the disgraced British statesman John Profumo, and warns King that the FBI has an extensive file on the civil rights leader’s own private indiscretions, including surveillance recordings. While his brother Bobby has served as the driving force behind Kennedy’s embrace of civil rights, the president nonetheless has issued public statements denouncing segregation and now sees his own political fortune tied to King, whose detractors in the FBI and elsewhere have drawn an implausible connection between civil rights and Communism. The president reiterates and amplifies his warnings to King and then departs for Europe on Air Force One.

Inside the White House, Bobby and Vice President Johnson complete the day’s agenda. Surrounded by more than two dozen Black leaders, the two rivals jostle for recognition as the Democratic Party’s white standard-bearer on civil rights. In one calculated moment, Bobby Kennedy embarrasses Johnson so as to “let everyone know who held the real power in the room” (184).

The Oswalds spend the summer in New Orleans. While Marina endures the family’s roach-filled apartment, Lee Harvey reads books, including John F. Kennedy’s Profiles in Courage.

President Kennedy makes a triumphant visit to Galway, Ireland, his family’s homeland.