Operation Mockingbird: CIA’s Shadow Over American News

What if the free press wasn’t free? What if headlines were shaped—not by journalists—but by handlers with clearance?

This episode of Unsettled: The Hidden Record unearths Operation Mockingbird, the CIA's Cold War campaign to infiltrate and influence major American media. From wire services to television anchors, intelligence operatives used funding, relationships, and subtle control to steer news narratives in ways that served national—and sometimes covert—objectives.

Declassified files, Senate investigations, and whistleblower testimony revealed that some of the most trusted names in journalism were on the agency’s payroll, or worked under its direction. The line between propaganda and press was thinner than anyone suspected.

This isn’t about conspiracy—it’s about confirmed manipulation. And it raises a question we still haven’t answered:
Who owns the narrative when truth can be bought?