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Who Killed JFK?

Very Special Episodes: JFK's Forgotten Summer w/Rob Reiner [Re-Release]

Who Killed JFK?

iHeartPodcasts

History, True Crime, Society & Culture

4.44.3K Ratings

🗓️ 31 December 2025

⏱️ 45 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

[This episode was originally published in June 2025.]

Eighty years ago, a young John F. Kennedy took a summer job as a journalist for Hearst newspapers, filing dispatches in the final days of World War II. Even the most seasoned JFK scholars often overlook this chapter, missing the influence those months had on the future president. 

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"JFK's Forgotten Summer" was the top performing Very Special Episodes episode of 2025. Tragically, it took on more significance earlier this month with the death of Rob Reiner.

Rob — who, with Soledad O'Brien, hosted Who Killed JFK?, one of the most successful podcasts of 2023 — kindly shared with us his knowledge and passion about the Kennedy family and appears in this episode. He was under no obligation to do this. He just wanted to help. It was an honor to work with him. We still cannot believe he and Michele are gone. 

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Listen to Who Killed JFK? from Rob Reiner and Soledad O'Brien wherever you get your podcasts. 

Check out Fred Logevall's excellent book: JFK: Coming of Age in the American Century.

Today's episode was written by Joe Pompeo. And thanks to our JFK voice actor, Tom Antonellis, for nailing another role. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

This is an I-Heart podcast.

0:02.3

Guaranteed Human.

0:08.9

On April 27, 1961, John F. Kennedy's plane touched down at LaGuardia Airport.

0:17.9

It was his first visit to New York since becoming president. He stepped off the aircraft and

0:24.3

slid into a black limousine, which whisked him to his suite at the Carlisle on Madison Avenue.

0:31.6

Hours later, a police motorcade accompanied Kennedy South to the Waldorf Astoria. Outside the hotel, more than

0:40.6

3,000 people jammed Park Avenue to greet the new leader of the free world. It was press

0:48.3

week in New York, an annual gathering of more than 1,200 editors, publishers, and newspaper executives.

0:56.6

President Kennedy had come to the Waldorf that evening to address the American

1:01.5

Newspaper Publishers Association.

1:04.6

His appearance was especially newsworthy.

1:08.5

One week earlier, U.S.-backed forces had flown the white flag in Cuba.

1:15.6

The Bay of Pigs invasion may have failed to topple the communist government of Fidel Castro,

1:22.4

but it did succeed in escalating the Cold War, a major foreign policy blunder just months into Kennedy's term.

1:33.5

Dressed in white tie, Kennedy approached the lectern in the Waldorf's dazzling grand ballroom.

1:41.0

His speech was titled, The President and the Press. Some may suggest that this would

1:47.3

be more naturally worded, the president versus the press, but those are not my sentiments tonight.

1:54.7

Instead, Kennedy said he had a more sober topic to discuss. But I do ask every publisher, every editor, and every newsman in the

2:05.5

nation to re-examine his own standards and to recognize the nature of our country's peril. In time of

2:14.4

war, the government and the press have customarily joined in an effort, based largely

2:21.8

on self-discipline to prevent unauthorized disclosures to the enemy.

2:27.6

In times of clear and present danger, the courts have held that even the privileged rights

...

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