Tag: jeffrey epstein
Trump Has Intimidated MAGA Outlets As Epstein Scandal Boils Over

Trump Has Intimidated MAGA Outlets As Epstein Scandal Boils Over

President Donald Trump has succeeded in getting his media supporters to stop talking about his old friend Jeffrey Epstein, the deceased sex offender and financier. Prominent MAGA media figures ignored a wave of Epstein news on Tuesday, signaling that Trump’s pressure campaign has paid off with their silence — even as (or, perhaps, because) his own corrupt involvement in the story has grown.

The initial resistance but eventual submission of Fox stars, Newsmax hosts, and MAGA influencers demonstrates that the Trumpist right’s only defining principle is that the president is good and his position at any time is the correct one — everything else can be tossed over the side at his command.

MAGA media figures lashed out at the Trump administration in July after the FBI and Justice Department released a memo which debunked foundational claims of the right’s Epstein narrative. Trump, who has a host of connections to Epstein, responded to that criticism by demanding his allies move on from the story and offering up new common enemies for them to focus on instead.

Meanwhile, Trump’s DOJ made a series of shady moves related to the case. First, the DOJ attorney who successfully prosecuted Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell in 2022 was fired. Then the department’s No. 2, former Trump personal lawyer Todd Blanche, interviewed Maxwell in prison with clemency from her old friend the president all but dangling over the conversation. The Trump administration subsequently transferred Maxwell to a minimum-security prison camp and released transcript and audio from the interview, in which the convicted sex trafficker asserted that she never saw Trump “in any inappropriate setting.”

Nothing to see here!

On Tuesday, members of Congress returned to Washington following the summer recess and brought with them a passel of Epstein news:

  • The House Oversight Committee met behind closed doors with six women who say they were sexually trafficked by Epstein.
  • Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) filed a discharge petition to force a vote on his bill with Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) requiring the release of files related to Epstein that have not been publicly released.
  • House Oversight Chairman James Comer (R-KY), in an apparent effort to forestall momentum around the bill, put 34,000 pages of Epstein files online — but as reporters and committee Democrats quickly noted, the documents included redactions and the overwhelming majority had already been released.
  • Massie accused Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) of orchestrating a cover-up of the Epstein story.

The influx of Epstein news, combined with a press conference on Wednesday featuring 10 of the disgraced financier’s victims, led Politico’s Playbook to declare this “the story Trump can’t kill.”

But while mainstream news outlets are providing plenty of coverage of the Epstein case, many Republican voters are likely not hearing about any of it. The propagandists they listen to prioritize remaining in Trump’s good graces over everything else, and they are largely following his command to sweep Epstein and his victims under the rug.

Fox host Laura Ingraham signaled she planned to cover the Epstein story, teasing the Oversight Committee’s document release at the top of her Tuesday broadcast. “We'll bring you any breaking details as they come,” she said.

But Ingraham never returned to the story. And her prime-time colleagues Jesse Watters, Sean Hannity, and Greg Gutfeld did not mention Epstein that night. On Wednesday, while CNN, MSNBC, and a host of other networks carried the press conference with Epstein’s victims live, Fox instead aired a few minutes of remarks from Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) before cutting away. The Trump administration even helped the network counterprogram, providing an appointee for Fox to interview.

Fox isn’t the only MAGA outlet giving the Epstein story short shrift.

Newsmax’s prime-time hosts — including Greg Kelly, whose show took a bizarre pro-Maxwell turn last month — also did not mention Epstein on Tuesday.

And several MAGA commentators who initially criticized the Trump administration’s handling of the Epstein story after the release of the DOJ/FBI memo did not mention Epstein on Tuesday on their X accounts, including Tim Pool, Laura Loomer, Charlie Kirk, and Jack Posobiec.

Trump told them to stop caring about Epstein and his victims, and after some initial resistance, they’ve done it. Instead, the MAGA right’s most prominent figures are focusing on stories the president wants covered in the way he wants them discussed. They are spending their energy greasing the skids for Trump’s federal invasion of Chicago and praising the military strike he ordered on a vessel the administration claims was carrying Venezuelan gang members and drugs.

Perhaps the stories Epstein’s victims tell at Wednesday’s press conference will force these people to find their consciences. But for now, it appears any effort to inform Republican voters about developments in the Epstein story will run up against the reality that their preferred news providers have dropped the story at Trump’s insistence.

Reprinted with permission from Media Matters.

'Very Hostile': White House Bullies Republicans Over Epstein Files Release

'Very Hostile': White House Bullies Republicans Over Epstein Files Release

The House of Representatives is weighing a bipartisan effort to force a vote on the full release of documents pertaining to convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, but President Donald Trump is actively discouraging Republicans from backing it.

That's according to a statement the White House released Tuesday evening, which was tweeted by NOTUS reporter Daniella Diaz. An unnamed administration spokesperson cautioned House Republicans against signing on in support of a discharge petition by Reps. Ro Khanna (D-CA) and Thomas Massie (R-KY) that Massie announced Tuesday.

"Helping Thomas Massie and Liberal Democrats with their attention-seeking, while the DOJ is fully supporting a more comprehensive file release effort from the oversight committee, would be viewed as a very hostile act to the administration," the spokesperson said.

The threat from the White House comes as Massie and Khanna are planning a Wednesday morning press conference in which several Epstein victims — including some speaking out for the first time — are planning to share their stories with Capitol reporters. And should Congress and the Trump administration continue to stymie efforts to release the files, some victims have indicated they plan to possibly name additional accomplices who allegedly helped Epstein exploit young girls.

Massie told MSNBC on Tuesday that Reps. Lauren Boebert (R-CO), Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Nancy Mace (R-SC) have already signed the petition. This means that, assuming all Democrats sign the petition, the full House could vote on releasing the Epstein files if just two more Republicans add their names.

If the bipartisan petition gets 218 votes, it would circumvent House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and bring a vote directly to the floor on whether to compel the Department of Justice (DOJ) to release all of the remaining Epstein-related files that have yet to be seen by the public. The New York Times reported in July that the DOJ is sitting on an estimated 100,000 pages of unreleased materials.

According to ABC News, the unreleased Epstein evidence categorized by the FBI includes several notable items, including a logbook of visitors to Epstein's "Little Saint James Island," which housed his private compound. The FBI also reportedly indexed "a document with names," which may be the rumored "client list" that Attorney General Pam Bondi has insisted doesn't exist.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

As Congress Returns, GOP Majority Will Confront Big Trouble

As Congress Returns, GOP Majority Will Confront Big Trouble

As Congress heads back to Washington this September with more at stake than ever, the GOP faces several challenges.

In an article published in The Hill on Monday, political analyst Juan Williams noted that when the House abruptly adjourned in July, Speaker Mike Johnson’s (R-LA) early recess granted Republicans a temporary escape from the fallout over the Trump administration’s refusal to release files related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. But that pause is ending, and the pressure is back, full force.

And this is just one of the GOP's challenges.

A government shutdown looms less than a month away, demanding immediate solutions and likely bipartisan cooperation for funding. Republicans, despite holding majorities, have stalled on passing next year’s appropriations — even as government debt climbs to record levels.

The piece noted that a deal will probably require Democratic votes, in exchange for restored funding to Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act, which were deeply cut by President Donald Trump’s controversial tax and budget reconciliation bill. Without action, millions face higher premiums, and voters across party lines are already siding with Democrats on this issue. Republicans across the country have faced backlash from their constituents during town halls, particularly when it comes to the president's signature legislation.

The writer notes that Trump’s approval ratings are sagging — especially on healthcare and inflation — adding to the pressure.

Williams further observed that with Trump not on the 2026 ballot, GOP lawmakers can’t rely on MAGA momentum to shield them from political fallout anymore. As Trump pollster Tony Fabrizio warned back in July, midterms are always “a slog” for the majority party, and Republicans still bear the scars of losing 40 seats in their first midterm under Trump.

"Epstein remains a problem for Republicans as Congress returns. But there are fires everywhere. And should Democrats take control in 2026, a third Trump impeachment will be on the table," the article said.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Ghislaine Blames Victim (And More From Her Pardon-Pushing Prison Script)

Ghislaine Blames Victim (And More From Her Pardon-Pushing Prison Script)

When I was helping produce a three part series about Ghislaine Maxwell in 2021, our team put in many hours discussing how and why she became the woman dozens of witnesses accused of heinous acts including underage solicitation, grooming, and trafficking. What kind of woman would serve up teen “nubiles” to a man who supposedly needed new girls on the daily? Why would she participate in an industrial scale sex trafficking operation? Was she pathologically inclined to assault? Was she groomed herself from childhood into the perfect tool for powerful men?

We hunted down and pored over clues to her psyche. We spoke with dozens of people who knew her in New York and in the U.K. where she grew up the tenth child in a wealthy family. We studied her father, media baron Robert Maxwell, a cruel, damaged oaf and one of the most mysterious figures in Cold War intrigue, associated with Israeli, and probably American, and maybe even Russian intelligence. What we didn’t do – what no one then could do - was hear from the woman herself.

Now she has spoken. In the released transcripts and audio from two days in a closed room with a Trump lawyer at a Tallahassee courthouse, she participated in a brazen feint at “transparency” for the Epstein conspiracy diehards threatening the MAGA coalition. It’s a fascinating charade and some enterprising theater director could turn the transcript verbatim into an excellent off-Broadway play.

Todd Blanche (one of the Epsteingate plumbers we covered here) threw softballs, and often answered Maxwell’s questions for her, while she suffered memory lapses, trashed victims, and demonstrably lied about her role and relationship with Epstein. (To be fair, Blanche did seem a little shocked that she couldn’t remember the reason for an $18 million payment from the sex trafficker.)

Blanche arranged the meeting after the Wall Street Journal published Trump’s “shared secrets” birthday note. That item is one of many artifacts – mostly photographic – confirming that the two men were close friends for years. The White House reportedly believed the item came from Maxwell’s side.

What else might be stashed in Pandora’s box?

While working on the documentary, we thought Maxwell would eventually trade evidence against untold numbers of powerful men ensnared in Epstein’s surveilled pleasure palace. Alan Dershowitz calls her “the key” to the case.

Anyone who reads the transcript and is familiar with the Maxwell story knows that there are many questions Blanche didn’t ask. But the transcript is filled with Easter eggs nonetheless.

Maxwell said a friend introduced her to Epstein as a potential husband in April 1991. If that’s true, is it just coincidence that it’s the same month Les Wexner mysteriously gave Epstein power of attorney over his entire fortune – a sum that enabled Epstein to catapult into the realm of blackmailable influential rich men. That same month, Epstein got his first private jet. According to flight logs, Maxwell would make 50 flights during the first year he owned it, often to Columbus, Ohio, where Wexner lived.

When Blanche asked her whether she had ever had any contact with an individual from Mossad, Maxwell replied: “Well not deliberately.”

“Pardon me?” Blanche replied, then moved on.

He was similarly blasé when she said Epstein hosted Ehud Barak, the former prime minister and head of military intelligence. Blanche breezed on to a question about Epstein’s use of testosterone instead.

Blanche worked to deliver backup for the MAGA obsession du jour, baiting his hook with the names of various Democrats – Andrew and Chris Cuomo, Bill Gates, Bobby Kennedy – trawling for evidence to build the elusive “client list” of progressive libertines. But Maxwell stood firm. “I never, ever saw any man doing something inappropriate with a woman of any age. I never saw inappropriate habits.”

Kind of depends on your definition of “inappropriate” of course: in court testimony, numerous women described Maxwell participating in the “massages” – stripping, pulling out sex toys, etc. To Blanche, she added a caveat: “Now, somebody's inappropriate and mine may be different.”

Inquiring minds might ask a follow-up to that. Blanche replied only: “Yep.”

In Maxwell’s memory, the bathrobe is the great leitmotif. “I don’t believe I ever saw him in a bathrobe,” Maxwell replied to a question about whether Dershowitz ever received a massage.

Maxwell used the exposure to settle scores and portray herself as a victim, a rebrand that, if successful, should win a Clio. She blamed her first public accuser, Virginia Roberts Giuffre, 16 when she was recruited to service Epstein, for turning Jeff from a regular guy who just liked a daily massage or two, into an insatiable sex monster who always “wanted new,” causing Maxwell to trawl the spas of Palm Beach or the Caribbean for “masseuses” (she never called the victims women or girls). Roberts, Maxwell said, was trained “to be what every man wants in all its manners, fellatio and everything else.”

The transcript ends exactly where it likely began as the stunt was conceived in Washington – the birthday book. Blanche’s final question is the one eating his boss alive: “Do you know -- do you remember being told or knowing where the book is now? Maxwell said she assumed the Southern District of New York feds had leaked it.

Maxwell knew exactly why she was there: She produced the money quote for Trump right away: “In the time that I was with him he was a gentleman in all respects.” The line made Fox News headlines and allowed MAGA propagandists to crow that Trump was ever honorable.

A week later Ghislaine was moved to finer prison digs, a way station perhaps to a pardon. And so the myth of the orange archangel sent from above to rescue children from pedophile elites lives another day.

AUTHOR NOTE: Readers interested in more about Ghislaine Maxwell, watch my recent Substack Live Sex Lies and Money with director Barbara Shearer and a long talk with Sidney Blumenthal at his Court of History podcast.

Reprinted with permission from American Freakshow

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