40 Celebrities We Didn’t Realize Had FBI Files On Them

Headed by J. Edgar Hoover, the FBI stood against the civil rights movement. That meant boxer Muhammad Ali, one of the most influential people of this era, was perceived as a threat. As Sonoma State University professor Michael Ezra told Reuters in 2016, “Ali was an important symbol to the civil rights movement, a galvanizing force, and him running around free was a problem for the FBI.” So, the agency kept a close eye on his activities.

Legions of fans followed Frank Sinatra’s life and career with fervent interest — and so did the FBI. Sinatra’s alleged connections to the mob are well-known, even though he denied any involvement with the underworld. Yet his meetings with gangsters are well-documented. So, for four long decades, the agency tracked the crooner’s movements and interactions.

Following a bunch of Freedom of Information requests in 2011 the FBI published its dossier on the actress Elizabeth Taylor. The late superstar, it seems, had been the focus of blackmail attempts, as blogger Michael Petrelis explained after seeing the files. He wrote, “The records reveal she was subjected to extortion threats over several decades, and that the agents investigated who and how the threats were made.”

When the Monkees released their debut single “Last Train to Clarksville” in 1966 they found instant success. Not many people realized at the time, though, that the song was actually a subtle objection to the war in Vietnam. One organization that did take note, though, was the FBI, which started collecting information on the band. As of September 2022, the final living Monkee, Micky Dolenz, has instigated legal proceedings in the hope of seeing what exactly was in the FBI files.

During the ’90s, Steve Jobs was considered for a position within the first President George Bush’s export council. That meant an FBI background check was necessary — and the results were interesting. According to files released in 2012, the FBI considered Jobs to be “a deceptive individual,” yet conversely somebody of “high moral character and integrity.”

In 1967 film producers making the Steve McQueen-starring movie The Thomas Crown Affair reached out to the FBI to ask if they could film the bureau’s office in Boston. The request was not granted. This story is included in the file the FBI kept on McQueen himself, as are details of threats made against the star. The dossier also notes that the A-lister once showed up at a civil rights event, which the bureau wouldn’t have endorsed.

The FBI dossier on Elvis was huge. The bureau took note of threats made against the superstar, but it also paid attention to his “corrupting” influence upon America’s youth. Despite this, the music legend himself was a major supporter of the FBI, and, as his files suggest, he even seemed to want to spy on other stars of the era on the agency’s behalf.

The FBI held 570 pages-worth of files on Walt Disney, who allegedly served as an informant for the bureau. The dossier shows Disney’s ruthless streak, a necessary trait for someone building an empire. Apparently, the cartoonist passed along information on people he perceived to hold communist tendencies.

Thanks to her activism in support of civil rights and against the Vietnam War, Jane Fonda was targeted by J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI. The bureau supposedly sought to destroy her reputation, which it arguably achieved quite successfully. It’s even rumored that Hoover made up fake rumors about the star.

With his music and activism opposing war, the American authorities had a strong distaste for John Lennon. The FBI started tracking his movements and interactions shortly after he moved to New York in the early ’70s. The Immigration and Naturalization Service even tried to get him deported from the country.

The FBI’s dossier on Albert Einstein was composed of a whopping 1,427 pages — but why all the interest? Well, Einstein was very vocal in his opposition to racism and nuclear weapons. Those were opinions that J. Edgar Hoover just couldn’t abide. He considered the massively famous scientist to be “an extreme radical.”

In 1969 Jimi Hendrix was placed under arrest by Canadian law enforcement in Canada. He’d been found in possession of marijuana, though the authorities couldn’t prove it was actually his. Still, they wanted to deport him anyway, so they asked the FBI to dig up some dirt on the guitarist, which it was happy to try to do. Despite its efforts, it failed.

The FBI collected no fewer than 2,000 pages on Charlie Chaplin, though it wasn’t the only intelligence service monitoring him. The British equivalent, MI5, was also on the film star’s case. Both the American and British agencies worked together to dig up dirt on Chaplin, who they believed harbored communist sympathies.

James Brown was known to attract the attention of law enforcement during his day. The FBI even had a secret file on him, but not necessarily for the reason you might think. The content actually revolved around a claim made by his partner that the Godfather of Soul had been harassed by the police. The FBI opened up an investigation into the matter.

Thanks to files released around 2009 we know now that the FBI was investigating Anna Nicole Smith between the years 2000 and 2001. But what was it looking for? Well, it seems it believed the model may have been embroiled in a plot to murder her husband’s son. Both she and the son were, at the time, fighting to get their hands on her husband’s vast riches. As far as we know no evidence was ever found that actually linked her with such a scheme.

Many of the FBI’s files on massive celebrities are full of seedy intrigue, but not so with Grace Kelly. The agency did indeed have a dossier on the actress-turned-princess, but not for any particularly juicy reasons. It was just because she’d once invited a top-ranking member of the bureau to a banquet. That’s all.

Jim Morrison was no stranger to controversy throughout his short life, which brought him to the attention of the FBI. Within The Doors frontman’s file are various mentions of his incidents and arrests. One report from 1969 reads, “He pulled out all stops in an effort to provoke chaos among a huge crowd of young people. Morrison’s program lasted one hour, during which time he sang one song and for the remainder he grunted, groaned, gyrated, and gestured along with inflammatory remarks. He screamed obscenities and exposed himself.”

Following his death in July 2010 the FBI released some of its files on the former owner of the New York Yankees, George Steinbrenner. In doing so, the agency confirmed that he’d been an informant for them. It seems his work for the feds was very useful, as he later received a pardon from President Ronald Reagan, which got him out of trouble for his illegal donations to Richard Nixon’s re-election campaign in 1972.

At the height of their fame, the FBI paid a lot of attention to the Grateful Dead and their frontman Jerry Garcia. The agency thought the group may have been supplying LSD to their audiences at gigs, but that wasn’t all. The feds also thought the group was a corrupting influence on young American citizens.

Published FBI files show that the agency and its leader, J. Edgar Hoover, took a great interest in the writer Ernest Hemingway. It was particularly concerned about his connection to communist Cuba, it seems. The bureau’s persistent spying on Hemingway has been theorized, by some, as the main reason he took his own life.

In 2013 the FBI released files it had on the late Whitney Houston. The content mainly revolved around a series of three investigations the agency carried out. Basically, the singer had been receiving horrendous letters from obsessive fans. On top of that, she allegedly was the target of a blackmail plot.

FBI files held on Tupac Shakur seem to show he was targeted by a group seeking to blackmail him. Apparently, the late rapper was subjected to phone calls in which his life would be threatened. Then, a group would apparently contact him and offer protection in exchange for payment. The FBI investigation into the matter began just two days before Tupac’s murder.

The FBI kept a keen eye on the comings and goings of the legendary entertainer Sammy Davis Jr. The agency was fixated on plenty of aspects of his life, whether it was the political causes he supported or the white ladies he dated. While never considering Davis Jr. a “communist,” the FBI did think of him as possibly “subversive.”

Across 600 pages, the FBI files on famed musician Liberace tell a tale of opulence and intrigue. One major section of the dossier revolves around a massive amount of incredibly expensive jewelry that was stolen from him in 1974. Elsewhere are references to his alleged connection to a criminal gambling racket.

No strangers to keeping cruel, invasive, and ultimately pointless files on so many celebrities, the FBI also kept tabs on actor Rock Hudson. The reason for its interest? Well, it had gathered evidence to suggest the star “was a homosexual.” That alone, it seems, was worthy enough of the bureau’s attention.

Jackie Robinson was the first ever black man to compete in Major League Baseball. Beyond that, he was a supporter of civil rights. A running theme within the FBI, that latter point caught the attention of the agency. It started monitoring Robinson in 1966, also paying attention to his support of workers.

A proud socialist, Helen Keller was subjected to the FBI’s interest during her day. The first blind and deaf individual to obtain a Bachelor’s degree, she was a well-known figure who criticized the era’s president, Woodrow Wilson, and who supported birth control. All of that was too unpalatable for the feds.

Citizen Kane was considered to be communist propaganda by the FBI, which meant its maker Orson Welles was a person of interest. The agency started keeping tabs on the star, something which he soon realized. Eventually, the situation pushed him to up sticks and settle in Europe for a while.

Because of his support for Cuba, the United States government kept a strict eye on writer Truman Capote. In turn, he helped to spread a story about J. Edgar Hoover embarking on a same-sex affair. Later reflecting on this, Capote once said, “It got Hoover upset, that much I know. And it got me… about 200 pages in an FBI file.”

During the winter of 1973 Colonel Harland Sanders, founder of KFC, received an ominous letter. Written by some shady figure calling themselves “The General,” the note contained a threat against Sanders’ life. The FBI took a look into the matter, but in the end it’s believed the letter was a cruel prank.

After he died in 2012 it emerged that the FBI had once looked into Bee Gees singer Robin Gibb’s affairs. It had been informed that the star allegedly had made a threat against the life of his ex-wife in 1980. It’s never entirely become clear whether this supposed threat was serious.

The murder of Christopher “Biggie” Wallace, otherwise known as the Notorious B.I.G., caused quite a stir in 1997. Theories have emerged that his killing was related to the murder of Tupac Shakur, which had taken place only shortly beforehand. In any case, the FBI put together a file on Biggie — but the case remains unsolved.

Princess Diana’s life was relentlessly spied upon by the British press, but the FBI was also keeping an eye on her. It was monitoring her during a visit to New York, as a group who likely opposed the royal family were holding a protest there at the same time. Plus, the feds also had info that implied she may be the target of a bomb attack, though it doesn’t seem like this was a serious threat.

While Sonny Bono’s death is officially attributed to injuries he sustained while skiing, one former FBI agent believes he was murdered. Ted Gunderson thinks Cher’s one-time spouse — who later became a politician — was taken out because he was on the verge of publicizing a massive drug and weapons racket. Gunderson’s claims have not been confirmed.

During the ’50s, New York Yankees star Mickey Mantle was embroiled in a blackmail plot threatening to expose an affair he’d supposedly been having. Upon learning of this situation, the FBI got involved and started monitoring Mantle. The existence of the 28-page dossier it built up was confirmed decades later in 1998.

The press and the public relentlessly monitored Marilyn Monroe’s every move — and it turns out they weren’t the only ones interested in the star. The FBI built up a file on Monroe, keeping an eye on her suspected sympathies to leftist causes. Her husband Arthur Miller was also of concern to the bureau.

The FBI reportedly compiled 33 pages on singer-songwriter John Denver during his lifetime. Topics of note included references to a number of threats made against the star’s life, plus his supposed drug use. There was even one passage that seemed to link him with the Mafia. Who knows whether there was any substance to the file’s claims?

When she was young, Lucille Ball had registered as a communist. She was later investigated by the U.S. government for that, but she asserted that she’d only done so to please her grandpa. That explanation seemed to suffice, yet J. Edgar Hoover reportedly continued to gather intel about the star afterwards.

Given his prominent association with the civil rights movement, it should come as no surprise that the FBI perceived Malcolm X as a threat. The agency kept tabs on the activist, monitoring his activities right up until the day he was murdered. That occurred on February 21, 1965, when he was just 39.

The allegations of sexual abuse made against Michael Jackson are well-known nowadays, so it should come as no surprise to learn the FBI had a file on him. The agency had conducted a number of investigations into the pop star, but no charges were ever brought. About 600 pages are in the FBI file, with only around half having been released so far.