October 15, 2003 (updated 03/22/09)

Richard M. Nixon press conference releasing the transcripts
of the White House tapes, 04/29/1974.

Nixon's ties to the assassination of President Kennedy run deep, from his association with Jack Ruby, his ties to Jimmy Hoffa and the Mafia, and his connection to CIA operative E. Howard Hunt. On a tape recorded in Nixon's White House office in 1972 he told two top aides that the Warren Commission Report pulled off "the greatest hoax that has ever been perpetuated." No one knew that better than he did.

by Don Fulsom

Seared into the memories of all Americans who lived through the assassination of President John F. Kennedy is exactly where they were on November 22, 1963. Yet private citizen Richard Nixon, who — believe it or not — was in Dallas, could not recall this fact in a post-assassination interview with the FBI.

The interview dealt with an apparently false claim by Marina Oswald that her husband —alleged Kennedy assassin Lee Harvey Oswald — had targeted Nixon for death during an earlier trip to Dallas. A Feb. 28, 1964 FBI report on the interview said Nixon "advised that the only time he was in Dallas, Texas, during 1963 was two days prior to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy."

While Nixon eventually came clean regarding his whereabouts on that fateful day, he seemed touchy whenever the matter was raised. For example, in a 1992 interview with CNN's Larry King, Nixon interjected he was in Dallas "In the morning!" when King cited the presumed geographical coincidence. Nixon left Dallas on a flight to New York several hours before Kennedy's noontime arrival at Love Field.