The Public Interest Declassification Board held an in-person executive session on June 18, 2025, at the National Archives in Washington, DC. The meeting was attended by PIDB members Mark Angelson, Carter Burwell, Ezra Cohen, Laura DeBonis, Val Demings, Carmen Medina, Ryan Montoya, and Alissa Starzak. The members discussed plans for a public meeting in the fall and the recent release of records of the President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection.
The agenda for the meeting is available on the PIDB’s webpage.
What has struck me most about the Kennedy Assassination records that were released was the utter lack of press and public interest. The information declassified by the President was old – often 30-40-50+ years old – and the release demonstrates that the threshold under EO 13526 on what ‘old’ information causes harm to current national security is incredibly low. Agencies must reevaluate how they have been applying section 3.3. Second, it would be of great interest for the PIDB to conduct a lessons-learned exercise with all stakeholders to gain perspective and offer recommendations for future changes. Third, more special declassification projects are coming. Congress has mandated the search and review of UAP/UFO records. But we are also coming up on the 25th anniversary of 9/11. It is (beyond) time for agencies to address an improved coordinated process that permits the declassification of 99.99% of these records for the American people.