12 People J. Edgar Hoover Hated And Tried To Destroy

J. Edgar Hoover didn’t just run the FBI for decadeshe curated grudges like they were a personal hobby. If you landed in his mental “problem file,” you
weren’t just investigated. You were managed: watched, boxed in, discredited, pressured, andwhen possiblepushed out of public life.
In the mid-20th century, that could happen with a badge, a telephone wire, a friendly columnist, and a frighteningly large filing cabinet.

To be fair (and historically accurate), “hate” is hard to measure. What’s measurable is behavior: surveillance, smear campaigns, immigration pressure,
and “counterintelligence” tactics aimed at weakening public influence. The people below weren’t all the sameand that’s the point. Hoover’s FBI didn’t
need you to be a criminal. You just had to be inconvenient.

How Hoover Built an “Enemy-Making Machine”

Hoover rose during eras when “radical” was an elastic labelsometimes meaning “spy,” sometimes meaning “union organizer,” and sometimes meaning
“celebrity with opinions.” Under him, the Bureau amassed dossiers on politicians, artists, scientists, labor leaders, and civil-rights figures. Later,
programs like COINTELPRO turned the goal from collecting information to actively “neutralizing” movements and reputationsoften by exploiting the gap
between what’s legal and what’s quietly doable.

The result: a playbook with recurring movespaint the target as subversive, isolate them from allies, weaponize personal vulnerabilities, and use
bureaucracy (immigration rules, passports, permits, permits to get permits) as a pressure lever. Here are 12 people who felt that machinery up close.

1. Martin Luther King Jr.

King became one of Hoover’s most fixated targets, in part because the civil-rights movement threatened the social order Hoover treated as “stability.”
The FBI’s surveillance of King escalated into efforts to discredit himless “public safety,” more “reputation demolition.”

The Bureau collected personal information, pushed damaging narratives, and used intimidation tactics meant to weaken King’s leadership and influence.
Even decades later, the episode stands as a warning: when a government agency treats “embarrassment” as a tool, truth becomes optional.

2. Marcus Garvey

Garvey’s mass movement and global influence made him a prime “undesirable” in the Bureau’s eyes. The FBI investigated him early, with deportation as a
long-term goal rather than an afterthought.

The campaign against Garvey shows a classic Hoover pattern: define the target as politically dangerous, then let legal pressure do the rest. Garvey was
pursued aggressively, and his vulnerability as an immigrant made removal from the United States a powerfuland finallever.

3. W.E.B. Du Bois

Du Bois was a scholar, organizer, and relentless critic of injusticealso the kind of public intellectual Hoover-era agencies loved to label “suspect.”
His FBI file reflects years of monitoring and political anxiety wrapped in official paperwork.

When the state treats dissent as disloyalty, even a lifetime of scholarship can be reframed as “threat.” Du Bois’ experience illustrates how easily
civic advocacy can be dragged into the mud of suspicionespecially during Red Scare politics.

4. Paul Robeson

Robeson had fame, a massive platform, and outspoken political viewsthree ingredients that made Hoover-era surveillance almost inevitable. The FBI
tracked him heavily, building an extensive record that treated artistry and activism like evidence.

Robeson’s case also highlights how pressure isn’t always one dramatic eventit’s cumulative: monitoring, career obstacles, public smears, and the sense
that every microphone might have a second job.

5. Albert Einstein

Einstein wasn’t just the world’s most famous scientisthe was also vocal on politics, civil liberties, and war. To Hoover, that combination read like
“influence + opinions = danger.”

The FBI compiled a massive file that framed Einstein’s associations and activism as potential subversion. It’s a deeply American paradox: the man whose
name became shorthand for genius was treated like a security risk for exercising free thought out loud.

6. Charlie Chaplin

Chaplin’s punishment wasn’t a courtroom dramait was a bureaucratic trapdoor. After years of suspicion and investigation, the U.S. government moved to
keep him from returning, in a climate where “unpopular” could become “unwelcome” overnight.

The Chaplin saga shows how reputations can be attacked indirectly: hint at disloyalty, let headlines do the shouting, then use administrative power to
make exile feel “procedural.” Hoover didn’t need to win a debatehe could win a paperwork war.

7. John Lennon

Lennon’s politics and celebrity made him a special kind of headache: the kind who can turn a concert into a message. During the Nixon era, immigration
enforcement became a pressure point, and Lennon’s legal status turned into leverage.

The fight to deport Lennon became a long public battleone where surveillance and “find something chargeable” energy hovered in the background. The
message to other celebrities was loud and clear: activism might come with an exit sign.

8. Josephine Baker

Baker was an international star and civil-rights advocatealso someone the FBI watched through the lens of Cold War suspicion. Her file reflects how
quickly “artist with causes” could be translated into “security concern.”

In practical terms, that meant scrutiny around travel, immigration, and associations. It’s the Hoover approach in formal wear: not always a public
scandalsometimes a quiet attempt to complicate your life until the spotlight moves away.

9. Jean Seberg

Seberg’s story is one of the clearest examples of reputational sabotage: a famous person targeted not for committing a crime, but for supporting a
movement the Bureau wanted weakened.

In her case, the FBI used media manipulation to spread a damaging rumor designed to humiliate and “cheapen” her public image. It’s a chilling lesson in
how quickly a government whisper can become a national headlineand how long the damage can last.

10. Cesar Chavez

Chavez led a labor movement that challenged powerful economic interests. That alone was enough to trigger intense suspicion in an era when organizing
could be treated like infiltration.

The FBI maintained files on Chavez, reflecting a familiar obsession: look for “subversive influence,” monitor relationships, and treat a social movement
like a conspiracy until proven otherwise. It wasn’t just about Chavezit was about discouraging people who might follow him.

11. Muhammad Ali

Ali was watched not only as a sports icon, but as a figure linked (in the FBI’s framing) to political and religious movements the Bureau tracked closely.
His fame made him impossible to ignoreand tempting to contain.

FBI materials show the Bureau’s attention to Ali’s relationship with the Nation of Islam. In Hoover’s world, a powerful public figure choosing an
unpopular path wasn’t just newsit was a “problem” to be documented.

12. Malcolm X

Malcolm X drew huge crowds and spoke in ways that made authorities nervousespecially those invested in “order” as a one-way street. The FBI kept
extensive files, monitoring his activities and networks.

Whatever one thinks of Malcolm X’s politics, the Hoover-era response reveals a larger truth: surveillance wasn’t reserved for violent threats. It often
targeted influence, charisma, and the ability to mobilize peoplebecause those are the hardest “risks” to arrest.

The Pattern Behind the Names

These stories share a theme: Hoover’s FBI often blurred the line between investigating crime and policing ideas. The tactics weren’t always dramatic;
they were frequently administrative, psychological, and reputational. When you can’t (or shouldn’t) arrest someone, the next best optionif your goal
is controlis to make them easier to ignore.

And that’s the unnerving part. A smear doesn’t need to be legally airtight. It only needs to be socially sticky.

Extra: of “Experience” From the Hoover EraAnd the Aftertaste It Left

Talk to people who’ve worked with historical FBI filesresearchers, journalists, librarians, attorneysand you’ll hear a surprisingly consistent
reaction: the first emotion isn’t outrage. It’s disbelief. Not because the documents are hard to read, but because they can feel so ordinary on the
surface. Memos. Summaries. Lists. Names. The language is frequently calm, even polite, like a grocery orderexcept the “items” are human reputations.

One common experience is the slow realization that surveillance isn’t one act; it’s an environment. People targeted under Hoover didn’t wake up to a
single cinematic moment where a trench-coated agent says, “We’re watching you.” They lived with smaller disruptions: rumors that “someone” said
something, invitations that never came, venues that suddenly became “unavailable,” friends who started asking strangely specific questions, and the
creeping sense that any private mistake could be turned into public theater.

Another shared experienceespecially among families and communities connected to targetsis the emotional whiplash of reading what the government
believed about them. The files often reveal not just monitoring, but interpretation: ordinary meetings framed as “fronts,” moral choices reframed as
“vulnerabilities,” and activism flattened into “subversion.” For many readers, it’s not only invasive; it’s insulting. You start to see how easily an
agency can write a story about you that you never consented to audition for.

Then there’s the modern experience of the paper trail itself: redactions. Pages missing. Paragraphs blacked out like a storm cloud parked on the truth.
Researchers describe a specific kind of frustrationknowing something happened, seeing the outline of it, but being denied the details that would make
it fully accountable. That uncertainty can become its own pressure tactic, even decades later, because it leaves the public arguing about what’s hidden
instead of focusing on what’s proven.

Finally, there’s the “aftertaste” experience: the realization that reputational sabotage is cheap and effective. Hoover-era tacticsleaks, insinuations,
selective enforcement, guilt-by-associationdon’t belong only to history books. They’re a reminder that a society can have free speech on paper while
still punishing people in practice. Reading these cases today often inspires an unglamorous but important takeaway: civil liberties aren’t protected by
good intentions. They’re protected by rules, oversight, transparency, and the public’s refusal to treat character assassination as entertainment.

Conclusion

Hoover’s legacy isn’t just a name on a building or a chapter in FBI history. It’s a case study in how power behaves when it fears losing control:
it watches, it labels, it leaks, it isolates, and it pressures. The 12 people above weren’t identical in ideology or lifestylebut they shared one trait
Hoover couldn’t tolerate: they mattered to other people.