McCorkle is a casually anti-Semitic FBI agent who looks into the Roths several times over the span of a year or two, confronting each member of the family alone to ask about the political speech and activities of Alvin and, later on, of Herman. Agent McCorkle believes that the Roths’ opposition to Lindbergh means that they are either organizing or taking part in a conspiracy against his administration—a sentiment which foreshadows the larger and more insidious anti-Semitic conspiracy theories that will overtake America in 1942.