Transcripts For CSPAN2 Jacob 20240703

Evil the Abraham Zapruder story. Mr. Hornberger, just as a reminder for those who might not be old enough to remember who was Abraham Zapruder, Abraham Zapruder was a businessman in november of 1963. The month that john kennedy was. He has offices that were located right there in dealey, and he an amateur filmmaker, he took movie pictures of his kids since the time they were growing up. And by this time, they were they were grown. But he decides to go out on that day, november 22nd, 63, to film the motorcade, which the president was traveling down the elm street he deeply admired the president. And so he goes and finds himself a pedestal on whats called the grassy knoll or near the knoll, and he ends up film the assassination of president kennedy. Theres a prudent film weve all heard of this. How many times has that been shown . Tv in its entirety . Oh, boy, i wouldnt have any idea. The first time it was shown was in 1975, which created all kinds of controversy. 12 years after. Thats right. Because it had been kept secret, sequestered for some 12 years. And then heraldo rivera, the Television News reporter, decides he got a bootleg copy of the film and he says, im going to put on national television. He was threatened with a lawsuit. He went ahead anyway and thats what broke the. And since then, i mean, you can see the film on the internet. You can it in oliver stones movie im not sure youre going to see it much on television, but certainly you can see it all over the internet. Who owns the zapruder . The government actually owns, the film today, the national in the national archives. They own the physical film, but the sixth floor museum in dallas owns the copyright to the film. So if we to show it during this interview, what would it cost us . Probably not very much. He would go to sixth floor museum and get permission you would tell them that it was for education purposes or research purposes. The is they would charge you a few hundred dollars i would assume if you were going to be making a lot of money off this film. Oliver stone did they would charge you considerably more in the tens of thousands of dollars. Mr. Hornberger why was it kept off the air from American Public for 12 years . Well thats a fascinating story. And thats really part of the subject of my book, the when life my, life maggie magazine was the one who negotiated the purchase of this from Abraham Zapruder, and when they first came to him, they said we were interested just in the print rights because life magazine, the most popular magazine, america at that time, but they had no ability to show the film as a film only had that or the the movie newscast reels and so forth. So he strikes deal with them about for 50,000 for the print rights which which was 450,000 in todays dollars. So this is a 26 second film nice chunk of change. Two days later they come back to him and they say weve decided we want all the rights to film, which is very unusual they offered him triple the amount, hundred and 50,000, which was about a million and a half. And took the deal. And as of the contract, they said, were going to give you a percentage of what we get when we put it out as a film. Well, then they proceed to sequester the film and the people at life magazine said nobody ever going to see this film. And just justification ostensibly, we dont want to see it. We dont want to people to see the violence in this film. What i argue in my film, in my book is that this was cia operation that. The cia, along with the military, orchestrated and carried out this regime change operation. Kennedy, in a highly sophisticated, no different from other change operations against foreign leaders in other countries like Patrice Lumumba in the congo and Mohammad Mosaddeq in iran. And that is part that process. They intended to keep this film, seek rid forever and thats what life magazines position was. As it turns out. Kathy jackson, who was the high executive at life magazine, was a c. I. A. Under what was called operation and it would have been very easy for the cia to prevail on his it, to do its dirty work and this film secret. What do you think the cias motive was then, if they were part of the life magazine suppression . Thats a fascinating question after the kennedy had already entered into a battle, fierce battle with the cia after the bay of pigs disaster. This was in 61. And kennedy had been set up by the cia in that operation. The cia had lied to kennedy, telling him, you wont need to any air support on this. Itll succeed without the air support. And they were lying. And so when the operation started to go down to defeat, kennedy says. They come to kennedy and say, well, we need the support. After all thinking that they that kennedy would never not give the support because hed be falling to the communists and kennedy stuck by his guns and said nope aint going to happen in the invasion down to defeat. Well, thats the big war that started kennedy and the in the cia it continues all the way through the the cuban crisis or the war then expands to include the military establishment. And after that cuban missile crisis where kennedy rejected the advice of his military advisors to bomb cuba, invade cuba, and he ends up striking a deal with that with the with khrushchev says okay take your out and we vow we will never cuba again. The war was on between kennedy and the cia and the military. So kennedy, this breakthrough where he says, were going to end this cold war and he goes to american university, he says, we are moving america a new direction away from this direction. The military and the cia want this country to move. And it was that conflict division that they deemed kennedy a grave threat to National Security and needed to save the country by removing him and elevating johnson, who was on their same page. So are you suggesting that the cia assassinated president kennedy and kept the film . Because the film demonstrates that there was a second shooter . Thats right . That the film demonstrate hated in its original format that there was a shooter from the front, that it was an ambush, that there were multiple shots. And i am suggesting this book that this was a regime change operation, orchestrated and carried out not just by the cia, but the military establishment and. The militarys role in this was the fraudulent autopsy that they conducted on the very evening of the assassination and the cias role in this in the aftermath of the assassination was to alter this is a brooder film to hide the fact that shots had been fired from front. You understand that people are probably skeptical of this after so years that this habit hasnt been proven necessarily. Of course. I mean, ive heard for years and years Conspiracy Theory, conspiracy. I mean, you get accustomed to that, but you just the way i have come out at is through the back door. Instead of focusing on what happened in dealey plaza, where the Conspiracy Theory people i mean, they have a point. Its very difficult to pin this crime on the security by focusing on what happened in dealey. However, if you look at the autopsy was conducted by the establishment, thats undisputed on the very evening of the assassination. This is the subject of my other book, the kennedy autopsy. There is unequivocal evidence of fraud. And that autopsy and there is no innocent explanation, a fraudulent autopsy, none. No one has ever come up with one and never no one ever will. A fraudulent autopsy. Nasa scarily means criminal culpability. The assassination itself, its part of a cover up. And the only people the military would be covering up for would be themselves. On the very next day, youve got the cia in a top secret operation that didnt come. Come light for about 40 to 50 years on the zapruder. And this is a subject of my book. The official narrative had always been if the film went from Abraham Zapruder to life magazines representative, a man named stoli to chicago to, the live Printing Press there. And then they took photographs that in the very next issue of life magazine on the 29th, november 29th, 42, 50 years later, peter, it came out that what actually happened to the film was that it went to chicago but then was diverted to Photographic Center in d. C. The National Interpretation center from there and thats the way they discovered that is that two researchers found cia official who took possession that film and did blow up some of the frames. Then that film was after he did that, the film was taken to the cias top secret york, where kodaks research and program was. It was called hawkeyegram was. It was called hawkeyed do everyg hollywood could. And there was only one reason to take that film to rochester, and that was to copy it on whats called an optical printer top quality, alter it, bring it back to washington and in an altered format where franks were deleted, the red spot where he is shot in the head is painted on and that is now the film that we know the altered film. And thats all detailed in my book Jacob Hornberger did Abraham Zapruder retain an original copy. Yes. On the day of the assassination, he had three copies made and two of those copies he delivered to the secret service. He retained a copy. The goes to life magazine, which then got diverted over to the National Photographic Interpretation Center and the statements unequivocal by the cia officer on that saturday night operation as. Well, as the sunday night operation, both of them have come forward and said, we this film on saturday night, we had this film in 16 millimeter format on sunday night. It was a total operation. Now, reason, 16 millimeters is important was because in dallas the film started out as a 16 millimeter film. But split down the middle. Thats the way they called it, a double date film. And then they take the two strips of 25 foot film and they put them together. So now they have a 50 foot long film of eight millimeter wide. And on the sunday night operation, they show up with a six millimeter film. You cannot paste a film back together again after youve split it down the middle, which proved without question whatsoever that it was a copy where mr. Zapruder as copy that he kept in his vault or at his office after he strikes the deal with life to sell them everything. Okay. All the film this was on monday he delivers his copy to life magazine. So they end up with the original and the copy. Zapruder never had a film that day. Thats right. Why do you talk about his family here that his family suffered because of his filming this 26 second film . Yeah, thats fascinating question. Thats actually what got into writing this book, alexandra, as a brooder, as a bruders granddaughter and she wrote a book on the history the zapruder, the Family History and i thought when i bought this book, this will be an interesting read just to see what happened with the film in the family. And ive done work in this area for many, many years while the provided much more than that, alexandra said in this book that there was a family taboo. Now she didnt call it a taboo. She called it a code that no one was to discuss the film as a reader family for like 4050 years you just did not mention the film. And she makes that perfectly clear. It was understood in the family, not a prohibition, but everybody understood. You dont talk about the film in the family, so she decides shes to investigate this. Shes i think in forties by this time, Abraham Zapruder, of course, is dead by this time. And so she writes this book and comes up with her excellent. Now she said she did this with a lot of fear, trepidation because you know, usually behind these taboos, theres a dark secret. And in families. So she did it with a lot of fear. And so i commend her for that. But she came up with to explanations that i considered were absolute ridiculous. She said one reason for the taboo was that grandfather was deeply grieved over the assassination. Deep grief, and the other one was that he felt really guilty that he to this huge amount of money that had been spread out over many 25,000 a year. Im looking at this, peter, saying thats ludicrous thats not why family taboos come into existence its dark secrets neither those is a dark secret and he died in around 69. Why were the taboo extend all the way through her childhood and growing up why would extend to her parents and if he felt that guilty, why wouldnt he just waive the rest . The 25,000 yearly payments or give them away . And so the purpose of my book is i said im going to figure what this dark secret was and. That was what motivated me to write this book. I figured out what that dark secret was, and thats the thesis, my book or part of the thesis. Mr. Hornberger do you think an unaltered of the zapruder film exists somewhere impossible to know. Its impossible to know whether they a that original or a copy of that original. I would doubt it. Very, very but its always possible that somebody a memento kept that original or a copy of that original. Over the years theres been rumors that people have seen such a thing. But im very skeptical. Whats your background. I grew up on the border in laredo, texas. I went to college at virginia institute. I went to law school, the university of texas. I was Trial Attorney in south texas and in dallas for 12 years. And then i left the law practice to go into the nonprofit educational world. And im the founder and president of the future of freedom foundation, which is a Nonprofit Educational Foundation that presents the principled case for libertarianism libertarianism, facebook . I think so. Im not sure because ive also coedited several books for the foundation. How many of your books are about the kennedy assassination say theres the kennedy autopsy, the kennedy autopsy, two an encounter with the evil regime change, the Jfk Assassination and the evil of the security establishment. Five books. Have you always been suspicious about the Warren Commission and the of the Warren Commission in the the official line about the kennedy assassination . No. I mean, actually, i had no idea there ever any controversy about it now. I grew up campaigning for john kennedy in the fifth grade. My dad was in politics. I went to the Lyndon Johnson for a barbecue. I met lyndon during that campaign when i i didnt any controversy at all the Jfk Assassination and went to see oliver stones movie jfk in 1991. Not even aware the controversy surrounding the film. I thought it was just a biography of this president that i campaigned for and i walked out of that theater just shocked absolutely shocked. And but what drove me to start reading, investigating everything i could find on this assassination Jacob Hornberger is most recent book is on your screen an encounter evil the Abraham Zapruder story. Thank you for appearing on tv. Thank you for having me. Peter. Brother Guy Consolmagno ia jesuit religious and an astronomer and