Eartha Kitt Was Blacklisted by the CIA for Calling Out the Vietnam War

She would eventually return to fame in the States in the late ‘70s.Ĭelebrities, veterans, parts of the Civil Rights and Black Power movements, feminists, the Gay Liberation movement, the labor movement, and so many more were involved in anti-war activities during the Vietnam War. According to a 1975 New York Times article, the CIA had already been looking into Kitt since the 1950s.

entertainment industry after her outburst upset the First Lady. Kitt told The Washington Post in 1978 that she was effectively blacklisted from the U.S. They don’t want to go to school because they’re going to be snatched off from their mothers to be shot in Vietnam,' said Kitt. They will take pot … and they will get high. efforts in Vietnam transformed from support and advice to full-scale war.

“You send the best of this country off to be shot and maimed,” Kitt told the First Lady, whose husband, President Johnson, had overseen the U.S. Perhaps the most famous example of this was legendary actress and singer Eartha Kitt’s famous January 1968 confrontation with first lady, Lady Bird Johnson at the White House during a luncheon that was supposed to be about juvenile delinquency.

Some celebrities of the era were also quite vocal about their opposition to U.S. Students weren’t the only ones to get involved in the anti-war movement.

Eartha Kitt Was Blacklisted by the CIA for Calling Out the Vietnam War