• Information on a letter signed “John F. Kennedy Jr.” calling President Biden a traitor is circulating online and is not part of the recently released JFK files.
• The FBI investigated the 1994 death threat to then-Senator Biden but closed the case with no suspects.
• The letter resurfaced due to the release of JFK files and ongoing QAnon conspiracy theories.
• The National Archives website provides access to the released JFK files, including photos, sound recordings and documents.

Social media users are circulating an image that purports to be proof of John. F. Kennedy Jr. calling former President Joe Biden a “traitor.” Here’s what we know about the JFK files so far and the FBI investigation that led to the years-old image about a death threat investigation getting a surge of interest.

While multiple conspiracy theories have been shared about the document, the first and easiest to debunk is that it wasn’t part of the new release of National Archive files related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The same letter has been circulated on social media since at least 2020, based on a media search at x.com the social media site owned by Elon Musk.

On Tuesday, President Donald Trump‘s administration started the release of what is said were all previously classified files on the 1963 murder of JFK. Possibly tens of thousands of records are now available to the public for the first time.

In January, Trump signed an executive order on his first day in office to release all documents on this and the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and presidential candidate Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, D-N.Y.

Here’s what we know about the letter and timeline of documents on the Warren Commission that were recently released.

What does the letter say?

The file being circulated online has been known about and reported on for years. The Associated Press reported on an FBI investigation into a letter sent to Biden in 2000. It was referenced in a piece on kidnapping plots as a data point not tied to any plot.

Politifact also debunked rumors that Biden was involved in a plot to kidnap JFK Jr. as a “pants on fire” level of false in 2020, referencing the 2000 story and an interview with Steven M. Gillon, a historian who wrote a biography on JFK Jr.

The file being shared on social media does not include the full handwritten letter, just the introduction and signature. Biden is identified as a victim in the FBI investigation.

Then-Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), got a letter postmarked Aug. 26, 1994 from Worcester, Mass.

“Dear Sen. Biden: You are a traitor…”

The signature was “John F. Kennedy Jr.”

The FBI reportedly analyzed fingerprints and handwriting, but the case was closed with no suspects identified in 1994.

Specifically, the September 1994 FBI report lists says it involved an UNSUB, meaning unknown or unidentified subject of an investigation.

More information is available on an FBI archive site that included redacted information about threats against JFK Jr.

The author, referring to an ongoing crime bill also included a death threat. “You must die.” That information is not part of the one-sheet image being circulated on social media, and the detail is left out of the conspiracy theories claiming it’s part of a plot against JFK Jr.

The FBI scan of the letter, which is a public part of the file, is too dark to read.

Why are people bringing up the letter to Biden signed JFK Jr. now?

JFK Jr. and his wife Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy died in 1999 when a plane Kennedy was piloting crashed.

QAnon conspiracy theories claim he’s alive, and in 2021 a group congregated in Delaney Plaza for days, believing he’d reappear in Dallas where his father was killed.

The interest in the letter seems to have surged with the recent release of files on the elder Kennedy’s death.

Why wasn’t the letter in the JFK files?

The letter, and information on the investigation into it, was unrelated to the Kennedy assassination. For the most part, historians are working through a mass of new digitized documents, looking for previously unreleased information.

But the data is filed by date ranges.

Files related to the Warren Commission date between 1954 and 1965, for the most part.

Executive session files were created between 1992 and 1998 but include information from 1963-64. Another set of sound recordings dated 1996 covers data from 1966-68. It includes TV recordings and interviews.

Biden did not become a senator until 1972.

What’s in the JFK files?

You can read the new files related to the Kennedy assassination on the National Archives website.

The files include photos and sound recordings, mostly from the 1960s. Many of the documents are scanned and some might be blurry or have become difficult to read over time.

Contributing: Marina Pitofsky and Josh Meyer

Bonnie Bolden is the Deep South Connect reporter for Mississippi with Gannett/USA Today. Email her at [email protected].