'Conspiracy is a pejorative term'

Roger Stone has earned a bit of a reputation as a behind-the-scenes political bad boy thanks to his colorful and quirky ways of being a political consultant. He got his start in politics working on President Richard Nixon’s reelection campaign, but you might know him for some of his more recent endeavors: organizing the Miami protest in 2000 dubbed the Brooks Brothers Riot, in which Republicans fought their way into a county election office to demand an end to the recounting of presidential ballots, or his long campaign against Eliot Spitzer.

His latest target, however, is an old one: former President Lyndon B. Johnson. In his new book, “The Man Who Killed Kennedy: The Case Against LBJ,” Stone lays much of the blame for President John F. Kennedy’s assassination on the 36th president.


“He is the linchpin of a plot to kill John F. Kennedy, in my view,” Stone told POLITICO, adding that LBJ “has complete motive.”

“He is facing political oblivion in November of 1963. He has the Senate investigation looking into Bobby Baker, who is his bagman in the U.S. Senate. He has the Justice Department looking into his wheeling and dealing with Billie Sol Estes, a flamboyant Texas con man. There are nine Time-Life investigative reporters on Lyndon Johnson, and they have a cover story coming out on the Saturday after the assassination on his epic corruption, his corruption of biblical proportions. So he’s a man staring into the abyss.” For the record, Stone claims that Malcolm Wallace, “a hit man for Lyndon Johnson,” was the gunman, not Lee Harvey Oswald.

It’s enough to get Stone dubbed a conspiracy theorist, but he’s having none of it.

“I don’t call it conspiracy purposefully because conspiracy is a pejorative term. It is used to denigrate those who question the government’s version of events,” he said.

Still, he’s not taking any chances. He recently told Human Events that he planned to wear a bulletproof vest during book signings in Dallas and Austin, Texas.

“I’ve gotten death threats, and I’ve had death threats, and there are still a few LBJ aficionados out there,” Stone told POLITICO. “I’m not traveling with heavy security or anything, so I’m going to wear a customized vest.”

On to more current topics, Stone, who has advocated for Donald Trump running for president, says his next book will be on Hillary Clinton.

“I don’t think she’s going to love it, to tell you the truth.”

As for Trump, Stone says that his presidential teases aren’t just for show.

“I think he loves his country. He’s really concerned about the direction we’re going. So I think his motivations are pure. Whether he would really change his lifestyle — his great lifestyle — to run for president remains to be seen, but he should never be underestimated. He is sitting on a huge amount of cash. He’s one of the richest and best-known men in the country, so he shouldn’t be underestimated.”

Stone won’t say whether he’s going to put his stealth strategy into place for 2016, but he has two candidates in mind: New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky.

“I really like Chris Christie,” said Stone. “Philosophically, I’m probably closer to Rand Paul. I’m a bit more of a libertarian.”

He would be happy to pull for Christie, however, if it means a better shot at having a Republican in the White House.

“Losers don’t legislate,” he said. “Anything is better than what we have now.”